PUBLIC DEFRAUDED

Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 30, 30 October 1942, Page 2

PUBLIC DEFRAUDED

Money Collected By False Representation "The Maori people are very bitter about this man, who has been carrying-on similar activities in Auckland and New Plymouth for two or three years,” said Detective W. R. McLennan when Daniel Rikihana Te Koho, labourer, aged 40, was Charged in the Magistrates Cot|rt, Wellington, yesterday with being a rogue am) a vagaoond. He pleaded guilty, to imposing on members of the public by falsely representing that he was collecting for Maori missions and for Macri soldiers overseas. ~ , The police.said that in,the five months Te Koho had been, operating in Welling-; ton and Lower Hutt he had collected large sums of money. Each day he haq headed a list with a name of some pro-; minent person, such as Mrs. B. L. Love,; widow of the late Lieut.-Colonel Love, of, the Maori Battalion. He had been apprehended by the police when at the end ot a day he had been seen to go behind tt; fence and tear up the list on which had just been entered a donation of IV/-. Mr. Stout, S.M., sentenced Te Koho to 12 months’ hard labour followed by 18 months’ reformative detention and ordered the payment for the benefit of Maori soldiets of the sum of £3/16/9 m accusec ls possession which he. admitted collectin o by his fraudulent action.