Magistrate's Court Thefts Totalling £300 From Army Admitted

Press, Volume C, Issue 29504, 4 May 1961, Page 12

Magistrate's Court Thefts Totalling £300 From Army Admitted

A farmer lance-corporal in the New Zealand Army pleaded guilty in the Magistrate's Court yesterday to two charges of theft of £3OO from the Addington Military Barracks Soldiers’ Club and the Army Department’s unit canteen at Addington, between July, 1959 and October. 1960. The accused, Paul George Smith, aged 24, a driver (Mr B. G. Dingwall), admitted stealing £2OO from the Soldiers’ Club funds, and £lOO from the department’s canteen while he was in charge of the funds. He also pleaded guilty to a separate charge of obtaining £5O by false pretences from Robert Lang Biggart on August 20. 1958. Smith was remanded to May 15 for sentence by Mr Raymond Ferner, S.M. He was granted bail of £2OO in his own recognisance, with a similar surety. Sergeant V. F. Townshend said that the police received a complaint from the Army Department on December 20 after an audit had revealed an apparent defalcation of snore than £6OO in the Soldiers’ Club account and £294 in the canteen funds. Inquiries showed that Smith had been treasurer of the Soldiers’ Club from August, 1959 until he took his discharge from the Army last October. He also had control of trading activities of the unit canteen. When interviewed. Smith admitted the thefts, and said he had spent the money on betting, liquor, hire-purchase payments, and purchases of furniture for a pending marriage which did not take place, said Sergeant Townshend. He told the police he knew others were involved in the defalcations, but was unable to do anything at the time because it would have exposed his own activities. Referring to the false pretences charge, Sergeant Townshend said that Smith bought a recordergram from Harris Bros., Ltd., on hire purchase and later sold it to Biggart for £5O. with a 12 months’ guarantee. It broke down, and Smith was asked to have it fixed. He took >t to the Addington barracks, where he was living, and it was there repossessed by Harris Bros, because of unsatisfactory payments. Pressed* by Biggart for its return, Smith decided to replace it, and bought a similar model from another firm undef'hire-purchase terms. He had this delivered to Biggart REMANDED On a charge of theft of scrap metal valued at £3l 6s 3d. the property of E. J. Adcock and Sons, Madras street on November L 1960, Bruce Anthony Newsome,

aged 17, was remanded on bail to May 11. Leonard Noel Forsyth, aged 43. a watersider, was remanded on bail to May 11 on a charge of theft of a canvas car cover valued at £l2, the property of the Union Steam Ship Company Ltd., on May 2. NOXIOUS WEEDS Bay Investments, Ltd. was convicted and ordered to pay Court costs only for failing to spray, cut, or grub noxious weeds in accordance with the Noxious Weeds Act. UNLICENSED RADIOS The following were fined for having unlicensed radio receivers: Peter Adolfs, £2; George Keith Ayers, £2; Dennis Bunz, £2; Richard J. Cameron, £2; Gordon Harvey Dale. £2; Dan Everest, £1 10s; R. A Fabling, £2; Geoffrey Arnold Fairbrother, £2; Patrick Desmond Fox, £2; Christopher Glendenning, £2; Bernard F. Hammond, £2; Colin Hunt, £2; Annabelle Jamieson, £2; Arthur Le Breton, £2: John Graham Mouatt, £2; Eric Morrison, £2; William Shepherd Newman. £2; Charles Owensworth, £2; William Priest, £2; William Ruwhiu, £2; Ronald Walter Riddell, £2; Edward James Reid, Court costs only; Ina Julia Smitheram, £2; David Robert Stuart, £2; Ronald Williams. £2; Claude Wright Williams, £2; Betty Windleburn, £2; John Morris Wood, £2.