DARING COUP.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 19034, 11 June 1924, Page 10

DARING COUP.

G.P.O. ROBBED OF £BOO. COOL FORGERIES. DANGER DISREGARDED. SYDNEY, May 30. The robbery of £BOO by a forged cheque from the General Post Office last week-end was one of the most daring coups ever carried out in Sydney. The forger had less than 30 minutes in which to work his scheme, and at any minute of the thirty the officer who should have collected the cheque might have walked in and spoilt the scheme. The cheque was for salaries for the engineer's branch o£ the office. From 9.45 a.m. on the cheques were being handed out to paying officers from the various branches. Sometimes these officers delegate the duty of collecting the cheque to one of the men in their department, and so the cashier suspected nothing amiss when a man took the cheque for the Engineer's Department. At about 10.15 a.m_ the genuine paying officer arrived at the cashier’s office and discovered that the cheque had been paid to an unauthorised person. In the meantime the cheque had been cashed at the Commonwealth Bank. The signature of the cashier, making it an open cheque ;

had been forged on the back, and this forgery had passed another officer, who had to check the amount before the cheque could be cashed. The thief made the cheque payable to A. Jones—a fictitious name—and was able to collect the whole of the amount without the cashier at the bank suspecting anything amiss with the deal.

But during the time the forger was at the bank he was in imminent danger of discovery ana arrest, for the right paying officer might have called for the cheque half a minute after he had collected it. The whole of the circumstances indicate that the scheme was worked by somebody with an intimate knowledge of the working of the department, and it is possible that there were two men concerned—one inside the office and a stranger who collected the money at the bank. Postal detectives and members of the Criminal Investigation Branch have been busy inquiring into the circumstances of the robbery, and it is expected that an arrest will be made in the course of a day of two.