WOMEN DEFRAUDED.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XLVI, Issue 147, 9 September 1925, Page 1

WOMEN DEFRAUDED.

A “LAY-OUT” SCHEME. LADIES’ FASHION EMPORIUM. SYDNEY, August 27. No fewer than 1200 women from all parts of New South Wales have been

defrauded, Sydney detectives say, by a scheme worked under the name of the Ladies’ Fashion Emporium. Two months ago, according to what the police have been able to ascertain, a man took an office in a building in Pitt street, city, and from there sent out emissaries to all parts of the State.

During a house-to-house canvass they told women of a new “lay-by” scheme, whereby, if they signed a contract and paid it small sum down, agreeing to keep up the payments unlit say £5 was reached, they could then select any of various intriguing items of feminine finery, which the Ladies’ Fashion Emporium claimed to have for sale.

It is claimed that most of the women paid their instalments regularly to head office in Pitt street, and that last week was the time when most of them had reached the final payment. Consequently hundreds of women made Sydney their Mecca for their holidays, seeking to combine business with pleasure by cashing in their interest in the Ladies’ 1 Fashion Emporium. But they found it was not at the address to which they had forwarded their money. A tired lift-driver—he was giving this direction all day and every day last week—informed them as they inquired, that the Emporium officials had left the place, and omitted to mention where they were going. Eventually many of the women visited the police and laid a complaint. The police soon got on the track of the persons who brought the Emporium into being, and at the weekend they made an arrest.