ARREST OF W. W. CHARTERS

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2309, 29 August 1881, Page 3

ARREST OF W. W. CHARTERS

REPORTED RECOVERY OF £ISOO. News is to hand by the mail which arrived on Saturday of the capture of W. W. Charters, for whoso arrest, on certain charges, constable Brooks left Christchurch on the 23rd of April last. We are indebted to the courtesy of Inspector Broham for a copy of the constable’s official report, whioh is as follows : Constable Oharlss W, Brooks, No. 600, begs respectfully to report having, at the Ist July, at 2.30, arrested at Bristol William Wombell Charters, alias John Moßae, on a charge of forging and uttering a cheque for £147 I2s, purporting to bo drawn by Margaret Chapman, of tho Heathcote district, also on a charge of embezzling the sums of £250, £l5O, and £l2O, the moneys of the Christchurch, Sydenham, and Suburban Building 'ociety. In reference to the above the constable bogs further to report that on arriving in England he at once reported himself at Great Scotland Yard, London, and then went down to Gravesend to await the arrival of the prisoner per ship Orari. Previous to leaving for Gravesend the constable presented a letter of introduction to the manager of the N.Z. Shipping Company, and the manager promised to render every assistance to the constable. Between 6 and 6 p.m. on the 28th June, the constable received a telegram from the Shipping Company, informing him that the Orari pad passed the Start Point at 8 a.m., all well, also stating that tho telegram had left a place called Kingswear, a small fishing port, at 2 p.m. Tho constable suspecting that some person had landed at this point, at onoe sent a telegram to Kingswear, and ascertained that a gentleman had landed, and had taken a ticket by tho 3p m. train that day for Bristol. The constable at onoe went'to London, leaving an officer from Scotland Yard at Gravesend to await the arrival of tho ship, and when he (Brooks) arrived in London he telegraphed, and sent photographs of accused by post, to Bristol, and then asked for the assistance of an officer to accompany him to Bristol He was informed that no constable was available, a murder having been committed on the London and Brighton railway, and all the available officers were employed searching for tho offender. The constable wrote to the Agent-General next morning, asking him to write to the authorities at Scotland Yard, asking for assistance, in consequence of which the constable left for Bristol on tho 29th, at 5 p.m. On arriving there he ascertained from the Bristol police that no person of the name and description of Charters had arrived at that place. On the 30th the constable made enquiries at the Banks and money changers, and ascertained that a man answering Charters’ description had sold £l7 of New Zealand Bank notes for £ls 10s, and had given hie name as Wm. Saunders, Lansdowne terrace, Scarborough. On making further enquiry the constable traced Charters to an hotel called the George and Railway, near the railway station, and found that he left there at 3 p.m. on tho previous day for Liverpool. The constable then sent a message to the police at Cheltenham, where there were some persons named Moßae residing, and proceeded to Liverpool in search of prisoner, having previously telegraphed there a description of Charters. On leaving Bristol he begged the local police to keep a sharp look out, as he believed Charters would return, and offered a reward to the hotel waiters to inform the police should he do so. On arriving in Liverpool at 3.30 a.m. on Ist July, the constable received a telegram to the effect that Charters had returned as he anticipated and that he was arrested. The constable at onoe proceeded again to Bristol, and found that Charters had come back at 12 p.m., and the hotel waiter had sent for the police, having to call the detective sergeant—in whose hands the case had been pissed—from his bed. Charters was injthe bar of tho hotel when the Bristol police were showing his photo, so that the constable was much indebted to the waiter for the arrest. He at once conveyed Charters to London, and on the 2nd July took him before Sir James Ingram, at Bow street, when he was remanded till the 7th, on which date he was committed to take his trial in New Zealand. The constable has taken passage for Lyttelton per ship Wanganui, and will sail on the 22nd July, if the extradition warrants are ready.

A Bristol paper gives the following particulars, the blunders of which will amuse our readers: —On Tuesday last a telegram was received at tho Central Police Station, Bristol, from Scotland Yard, London, giving a description of a man named William Waubell Charters alias John MoOrae, who was " wanted ” at Christchurch, New Zealand, on a charge of forgery. Detective-sergeants Smith and May promptly made inquiries, and ultimately traced and apprehended a man at the George and Railway Hotel, Yiotoria street. Charters, who is but a young man of thirty-one, was in partnership with a gentleman in Christchurch, in the business of land agents, &0., and at one time held a good social position in the town, having been a member of the town council, and onoe served as Mayor, It appears he left New Zealand in a sailing vessel, the Orari, but the fact of his departure becoming quickly known, a detective, who left in a steamboat, arrived in England quite a fortnight before him, A singular fact is that although Charters sailed in the Orari, whose destination was Kingswear, he is alleged to have landed in a fishing smack at some other port. Detective Brooks, of the police force, Christchurch, New Zsaland—and the only Englishman in the force—arrived in Bristol for Charters yesterday afternoon. When the latter heard that an officer had come for him, he inquired his name, and expressed himself pleased that it was Brooks, as they had known each other well at Christchurch. Tho detective, who had been in England about three weeks, started with the prisoner by an early train for London, from whence the return journey will be taken to New Zealand. Charters is said to be a native of Cheltenham. The visit of Detective Brooks to Bristol is of interest, taken in connection with the journey of Inspector Short, of the Bristol force, to Calcutta on a similar errand.

We taka tho following from tho “ Homo News”: William Wombwell Charters, twenty-eight, of Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zsaland, a commission agent, was charged with forging an acceptance to a bill of exchange for £147 12s 5d in July, 1880, and with fraudulently converting £520 belonging to the Christchurch, Sydenham, and Suburban Building Society to hie own use. The arrest was effected at Bristol by »n officer from New Zealand, who arrived via San Francisco, having started some time after the prisoner. Tho prisoner was agent for a Mrs Chapman, of Oparra, New Zealand, and it appeared ho had drawn up a bill for £147 12s sd, whioh purported to be accepted by that lady. Upon presentation she, however, denied all knowledge of tho transaction. The prisoner was manager to the society whose money ho was charged with having fraudulently converted to his own use. His duties were to draw cheques and obtain the necessary signatures of directors. On December 6th, he presented a cheque for £250 to Mr Stewart King, a director, to obtain his signature, A second cheque for £l5O was also signed and handed to the prisoner. Subsequently it was ascertained that that ho had not accounted for these amounts to the society, but that the money had been drawn from tho bank. The case was remanded for further evidenos.

Wo have been informed on good authority that Charters had a sum of £ISOO on him when arrested.