£9847 INVOLVED IN CHARGES

Chronicle (Levin), 2 May 1946, Page 4

£9847 INVOLVED IN CHARGES

-Press Association

SALESMAN BEFORE COURT

By Telegraph—

NAPIER, May 2. Money and goods valued at £9847 6s lld were involved in charges preferred before justices in the Police Court to-day against Kenneth Hugh Bennetts',, aged 28, a salesman, of no fixed abode. Bennetts faced sixteen j charges of theft, breaking and entering and theft, and obtaining mon^y and goods by false pretences at Napier, Gisborne, Wellington, Hamilton and Auckland. He was also charged with being in unlawful possession of a .45 calibre automatic pistol, and presenting a 'firearm at a police officer. Bennetts' appearance was the sequel to a sensational arrest in the Central Hotel on March 31 last, when the accused is aileged to have been overpowered by two police officers after confronting" them with a loaded automatic pistol. Describing how Bennetts was trgced to the hotel on March 31 through a letter card found in a Napier shop which had been burgled the night before, DetectiveSergeant K. Mills said in evidence ,that when he and Detective Reid reach'ed the accused's room. Bennetts confronted them with an automatic pistol. They rushed the accused, who resisted desperately, but was eventually overpowered and disarmed. The pistol was found to have five shells in the magazine. Accused later made statements regarding the aileged thefts in -Napier. • Witness admitted under crossexamination that the pistol was. not cocked. • The -case is proceeding.