A ROMANCING CRIMINAL.

Evening Star, Issue 3508, 21 May 1874, Page 3

A ROMANCING CRIMINAL.

(From the Southland Times. ) There was an unusually large attendance of spectators at the Resident Magistrate’s Courthouse on Saturday. The cause of this was, presumably, to behold in person, and to learn the particulars of the recent career of a young min who has lately been playing what is called the heavy swell” m Southland, and was that morning brought into Court on a charge of forgery. Ihe spectators, however, were disappointed, for the accused having been chained on the warrant issued from Dunedin, was, after beingidentified and sworn to as the person described in the warrant and ‘ Police Gazette,’ simply remanded to that City. The young man, who has for some time back gone under the name of Janies Sutherland, was only quite lately released from Dunedin gaol, in which he had done six years’ penal servitude for a crime similar to that with which he is now charged, in April last he went to reside at M’Gavin’s Hotel, in Dunedin, where he represented himseU as the son of a runholder in the Waitaki district, borne time towards the end of the month he left lus hotel, to go, as he said, on a cattle-buying tour on behalf of his uncle : and so, having hired a horse from his landlord, he started on his journey. After his departure trom Dunedin the police discovered that he had uttered a forged cheque, and intelligence to that eltect was of course forwarded to the various police officers throughout the Province. The place to which he was traced after leaving Dunedin was Palmerston, where he is said to have torged and uttered several cheques. After going up to the Waitaki, and calling at some smaU townships, he seems to have visited Oamaru, in which he remained only for a few hours, . leaving it on the night of the same day on which he arrived. From Oamaru he went to Cromwell, and from thence to the iNevis where it appears he had what is technically denominated a “ heavy drunk,” in consequence of which he lost himself amongst the ranges. In his bewildered wanderings he arrived ar. d ,’ 8 hufc > wbere . it is said, he turned Mr M Gavin’s by that time jaded steed adrift, and unobstrusively took possession of a grey nag belonging to the shepherd. He then proceeded on it J oulne y with the intention of visiting the Nokomai, but the next place he chanced to reach was Kingston, where he spent liberally and drank profusely. The next we hear of him is at the Elbow Hotel, where it seems he uttered another forged cheque. Arriving in Invercargill late on the evening- of the 9th inst., he put up at the Club Hotel, and having given dut that he was the sun of a runholder in the Waitaki he soon secured numerous acquaintances. After staying a day or two in town, he sold the shepherd’s grey horse to Mr George Smith, of the Gladstone Hotel. He became possessed of the ■ open sesame” to several select social circles, and true knight errant he made love to an ingenuous young damsel, and even proposed and was accepted. All this time the police of various parts of the Province were anxiously looking for the gay cavalier, who was quietly taking his ease at his inn.” About the time (the middle of last week) our own guardians of the peace received intimation of “ the man and his deeds,” who seems to have taken a pleasure jaunt into the country. This reached the ear of bergt. Fleming, who, with characteristic skill, traced the rover to Wallacetown, and thence through the Mabel district to Woodlands, where it was found he had been paying a complimentary visit of inspection to the Meat Preserving Works, rhe indefatigable sergeant, tracking the object of his anxious care from one place to another, at last came upon him at a place a few raiies on the Southland side of the Mataura Bridge, to which they journeyed on pleasantly together, the soi-dislant runholder’s son little knowing the business and intentions of his sociable fellow-traveHer. On arriving at the .bridge the Sergeant quietly succeeded in induemg Jhis companion to visit the police camp where, coming to see how the wind blew, he made an agitated attempt to swallow some laudanum which he hgd in his pocket, but Sergeant bleming. succeeded in preventing him. ihe prisoner afterwards told his captor that he had resolved if possible never to be.taken alive; but the Sergeant, he confessed, was altogether too clever for him. The capture was certainly an important .one, and was very cleverly done Sergeant Fleming is, we think, entitled to something more than. credit. The prisoner, we believe, instead of being sent to Dunedin, is to be tried in Invercargill, having committed iudic.able offences in this district.