PRINCE OF IMPOSTERS.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIX, Issue 5341, 19 October 1928, Page 4

PRINCE OF IMPOSTERS.

TWENTY YEARS OF FRAUD. s BEGAN BY ROBBING HIS SATHER. “A prince among imposters,’’ was ’ the description applied by Detective- ; Sergeant Hay wal’d at the London; Sefr , sion-s tq Alfred Craven, agqdl 38, an engineer, w.ho, after pleading guilty, , was sentenced to thr.ee years’ penal , servitude for 'obtaining £lOO from Mr Charlqs Jcjhn' Whiting by fraud, and .■ £lO from Mr Alfred Wjajter Euston by false pretences. He; had 16 previous convictions. Craven, whose correct hame is Alfred Noel Fewsdale Craven, from his start in crime in 1907, has 1 posed chiefly asi a"man of wealth. He| is the son qf a Sheffield) ironfounder., and his first victim was his father, whom he robbed of 'his watch. Next, he forged his father’s name to a cheque. Craven sent abroad, and ini 1908 married in New South Wales. He went to, South Africa wlith his wife, and remained thenei until early in 1914. Most of the time Craven was in prisons in Johannesburg, Natal, and Capetown for posing as a richman anfli obtaining money by fraud. Leaving his wife and a son. in Johannesburg, he returned to England, and op the journey proposed tq a young womaji from whom he obtained £5O. NAVAL DESERTER. ’ Soon after arriving in England he fqund his, way , into prison. In- .1915 lie joined the Royal Nava.L Air Serv’oe and w.a,s sentenced for desertion and dismissed from the service, Still wearing 'uniform, he next stayed at a Fareham, Hampshire, hotel, and left without paying his bill. He was arrested at Weymouth and sentenced to, a. month’s imprisonment. Since then he has served two terms of penal servitude, anfli ;at Brighton last August be wag sentenced to] six' months’ imprisonment for fraud. On his l release in -March this, year lie carried out a hear tless fraud on a wo,man in poor state of health, ruined her financially, and left her destitute. Cra,ven’s latest plan for deceiving people was to, Induce a solicitor to conduct certain business for him in relation to a reversi-ojn due to him under a will. ' Whenever he was pressed for money he staved off his creditors, by referring them to, the solicitor, who was able to; tell them that his client was’ a man of substance.