EX-VICAR CRIMES

Hokitika Guardian, 31 May 1930, Page 2

EX-VICAR CRIMES

BIGAMY AND FRAUD

REYES LED

FIVE YEARS’ GAOL,

Tlie remarkable criminal record of an ex-\ icar was revealed a,t Liverpool Assizes recently, wfien lie was sent to five years’ penal servitude, for offences at Liverpool. and Blackpool. Percy Stanley Scott (63), a tall man of venerable and rather distinguished appearance, was found guilty of obtaining by false pretences £364 worth of jewellery from Messrs Boodle and Dunthorne, jewellers, Lord Street, Liverpool, and sums totalling £3OO from James Cavgill, company house proprietor, Blackpool, and £25 from William Aislitt, estate agent, Blackpool.

LONG SENTENCES

Inspector Thomson then stated that Scott, whoso correct name was .Samuel Walton Kav, was born at Bury in 1867. He was educated at Bury' Grammar School, and, after three years as a pupi] teacher at a local Wesleyan school studied at- Richmond College with a view to entering the Wesleyan ministry. He then went to Carnforth, where he joined the Church of Ehglarld and was -ordained.- After, serving as a curate at Salford he became | 'vicar I of Middleton ' Parish Church,, where he married in 1892. He later: became a vicar in Warwickshire, and remained there until 1893, whore he was convicted at Warwick Assizes of forgery and sentenced to twelve months’ imprisonment. His subsequent convictions were. Lancaster Sessions, 1900, 2 years for false pretences; Liverpool Assizes, 1905,. five years'for forgery, false pretences and bigamy ; Wells Assizes, 1915, live years for forgery and bigamy. The judge: Had these women any money ?

Inspector Thomson: As far as I know he did not commit bigamy to obtain wealth.

PRISON TO, HOTEL.

Inspector Thomson sn;id alt St';; Albans sessions in 1920- Scott was sentenced to five years for false pretences., In Jh-ne, 1929, -a-t Chester Assizes, 1)0 received six months for false prei fences! in the name of Hatfield. It. then transpired that on leaving RlaekT pool lie had obtained money and lodgings by false pretences from varidu-s” people; at Llandudno. On bis di's- : . charge from prison in November he' went (straight to tlie North Western Hotel; Liverpool, and lived there until iliis arrest. ‘ , 'j The- case ' for the prosecution, outlined by Mr Howard Jones, was that. Scott; obtained jewellery on November, 1925, by representing himself as a man of wealth who was contemplating marriage. He referred Messrs Boodle and. Dunthorne to a Liverpool solicitor ’to whom he had previously wade, statements, as to his means, and given instructions for the preparations of a codicil to his will. \ Half an hour after obtaining the Scott pledged a £125 emerald and diamond ring for £SO, having first, asked £BO. It was suggested that lie used £ls of this to pay his bill at the North Western Hotel, where he had been staying for about ten days, having described himself on registering as a member of the Royal Automobile Club, London. Scott gave a £2B bracelet watch to a Manchester widow to whom he proposed marriage. All the jewellery had been recovered. The Blackpool charges related to loans obtained on a similar representation. Scott .also stated that his brother had been drowned at sea, leaving him sole heir to an estate which had been variously estimated a.t £12,000 to £25,000.

HIGH-FLOWN L VNG UAGE,

Scott, avJio conducted his own defence declined to go into the witness box—“l never take an oath, on prinhe said—but he 'made a remarkable. speech of two hours’ duration from the dock. The address was couched in such high-flown language that Mr Justice Roche, intervened with the suggestion that Scott should express 'himself in simple terms, but Scott; replied: “I am putting it in ray own natural way.” He maintained that the charges against him were unfounded,, that he really was a man of affluence and could “buy up the firm lock, stock, and barrel,” and that the police i» pursuing their obsessions had become persecutors. “They havg tried to injveigle from me my one ewe lamb, the repository of my resources,” •h* declared. “Every man likes to he his own high priest in some exclusive sanctuary he treasures. Why should I throw open the sacred tmple of my affairs to he desecrated by three rapacious underlings?” Scott quoted Scripture in referring to friends who had turned against him: “These are they who, when tribulation and persecution ariseth, are offended, becausg they have no root in themselves.”

Scott declared that he had no intention. of pledging the ring when he thought it, but out‘ : de the shop he met a woman friend who was in urgent need of £45.

“Y(H'R ONLY HOPE.”

“X have a,shod the prosecution not to offer evidence on. the further indictment, said the Judge in passing sentence, “because f hope that even now ; you may end your liie, which is already advanced without stigma of a verdict that you are an habitual criminal. Rut the only hope for you and for the unfortunate people on whom vou have been in the habit of living by means of tissues of lies is that "you should he confined fora considerable x>eriod,”