PASTOR SENT TO GAOL.

Waikato Times, Volume 108, Issue 18165, 1 November 1930, Page 14 (Supplement)

PASTOR SENT TO GAOL.

FRAUD ON A LANDLADY. Described as a Congregational minister, John Gynddydd Davies, 54, a native of Llandyssul, was brought up at Swansea on a charge of obtaining credit by fraud, says a London paper. It was stated that Davies, a wellspoken man, stayed for 12 days at a house in St. Heen’s Road, Swansea, and when given his bill said he was going out to cash' a cheque. He did not return and was later found sitting in the art gallery, w'here he sa'id ha was waiting for the deacons.

Mrs Mary Ann Lloyd, the landlady, then spoke to a policeman, to whom Davies, it was alleged, swore that he had never seen the woman before. “I am a preacher of the Gospel," Davies told the officer, “and my address is Chapel House, Horeb, Llandyssul, Cardiganshire.” Detective W. G. Franklin gave evidence that he arrested Davies on a warrant at Aberystwyth. Davies had stated that he was educated at Carmathen College and had been engaged as a Congregational minister in London for ten years. The Cardiganshire and other police, added Detective Franklin, had received numerous pomplaints about Davies, who, he added, was convicted of a similar offence and sentenced to two months’ imprisonment at Aberaman in 1928. Some of the sums involved totalled £ll, but the people concerned would not prosecute.

In a statement to the Court, Davies declared that he had no intention to deceive. He went to the place in a spirit of a Christian mnister, and went away with the intention of paying as soon as he had obtained the money. “I am an innocent and defenceless man,” he continued, “and have been in the service of the Church all my life. I am a man of very sensitive spirit and deep religious convictions.” Sentence of three months’ hard labour was passed.