EXTRAORDINARY LARCENY CASE AT HAWERA.

Dunstan Times, Issue 1191, 26 December 1884, Page 3

EXTRAORDINARY LARCENY CASE AT HAWERA.

A charge of stealing LIOO, on which a well-known resident of Hawera named George Hellier has just conmittcd tor trial, has created some excitenent on the Waimate Plains. The prosecutor is Frederick Wallis, well-known in Wellington a few years ago as landlord oi the Branch Hotel, and more recently landlord of the Commercial Hotel in Hawera. The circumstances of the case are very peculiar and somewhat involved, but the following is a brief outline, of the leading fpjts as they transpired at the police examiiation on the 4th inat.Wallis sold out of the Commercial Hotel early in September,and received from Mr Putford, the pmohttser, a cheque for L 725. Mrs Wallis went away to Wan ganui, taking the money with her. Mr Wallis followed her, and after remaining in Wanganui seven or eight days returned to Hawera, bringing about L6OO of the tnonoy with him. In Hawera and Patea he paid away between L3OO and L4OO. He then had a 1100-note left and some L 5 and 1.10 notes. Two or three days after his return he went to Hellier’s house and slept there, being, according to his own account, very ill, and according to other accounts, very drunk most of the time. On the 26th,. while he was at Hellier’s hmise, his wife ci me to the house and asked for him. She was told he was ill. upon which she went in, and, as she stated in her evidence, took away a packet of her jewellery which Wallis had in his pocket, an-l nothing else. Next day Wallis missed the 1,100 note, and asked Hellier if he had seen anything of it. Hellier replied that he h»d not. Wallis subsequently filed * declaration of bankruptcy, and in consequence of what transpired at his examination a criminal prosecution was commenced against him. Subsequently i‘ was ascertained that Hellier had paid away aLlOO'notetoMr Roy, solicitor, of New Plymouth, in discharge of a mortgage. _ He accounted for the note by saying a friend had lent it to him According to. the line of cross examination taken by Mr Matthews, the counsel for the defence, it appears that Hellier maintains that Wallis lent him the note to pay off the mortgage, telling him at the same time that this wife (Mrs Wallis) had robbed him of L 1.300 or L 1,400. and that he meant to plant his money until he. could get away to his sister in Australia. Sergeant Anderson, in his evidence, stated that after Hellier’s arrest a search was made at his house on the sth November, and a tin unearthed in the garden containing three L 5 notes. The whole circumstances are very extraordinary, and present a fair field for the exercise of police ingenuity in the unravelling. '