NIGHT PORTER ASSAULTED

Hokitika Guardian, 8 April 1931, Page 5

NIGHT PORTER ASSAULTED

WORKING MEN’S CLUB BROKEN INTO.

(By Telegraph —Per Press Association)

WELLINGTON, April 8

The. smashing of a window on the ground floor c.T the Working Mens Club in Mercer Street, and cries for help about two o’clock this morning attracted the attention of three passersby and a constable who investigated ami found that the night porter Madrigan had been assaulted by two masked men.

Madrigan was entering the side door at the foot of the stairway inside the main passage with a bucket oi water when h,. was suddenly attacked b,v the men. He was bit three times on the hack of the head, blindfolded, tied by the arms and legs and dragged to the hack of the building. The robbers forced the door leading off the bar to the office. The saH'e die! not appear to have been interferred with, although the motive of the men was undoubtedly robbery. Madrigan was sent to the hospital. ROBBERY THE MOTIVE, WELLINGTON. April J*. Although nothing appears to have been stolen from the Working Mens' Club tlie motive was umloubtwily rubbery. The manager’s room was broken into and the roll-top desk was found open, but nothing was taken. The safe does not appear to have been tampered with. Tills and cash registers in the bar-room were untocuched. Interviewed in the hospital to-day, Madrigan said the attack took place in the passage oil the main hall oil the ground floor oil the club. He saw both mi'll but before he could ■ speak one hit him on the head with a sand hag and he fed down and when he tried to get up a man struck him again He endeavoured to crawl awav but was hit again. Madrigan remembers the men blindfolding him and tying him up, but then lost consciousness When he came to he was lying in the furnace room about 30 yards away from where the assault took place. He managed to release himself and break a window and attrack attention.

After Madrigan had been struck the firv;t time he asked the men not to knock him about. Ihe man with the sand ag replied :—“Y ou have got to have it.” Madrigan thinks the men had a knowledge of the run of the place because one said when tying him up “let us eariy him down to the ’furnace room.

Vt-i'drigan’s condition to-day is satis factory.