CROMWELL MAN CHARGED

Lake County Mail, Issue 29, 10 December 1947, Page 3

CROMWELL MAN CHARGED

THEFT AND FALSE PRETENCES Nine charges bi' theft and false pretences were admitted by Alexander Robert Pearson, single, a labourer, aged 28, of Cromwell, when he appeared before Mr J. D. Willis, S.M., in the Dunedin Police Court yesterday. “.The defendant has been living on his wits for some time," said Chief Detective T. Y. Hall. “ He is not fond of work and has been obtaining money by defrauding his friends. The offences, which involved a total amount of £2l (is, were committed between November (5 and December B.’’ The chief detective described how the accused had stolen £7 from the home of a cook in Rotorua, who had befriended him. He then travelled to Christchurch and obtained a permit to catch a slow train to Dunedin, giving a- false name. He had no money when he boarded the train and was unable to pay the fare of 265. While travelling by bus from Cromwell to Dunedin on November IS he got oft at Roxburgh, continued Mr Hall. By falsely representing that he was William Pearson, of Cromwell —his twin brother and a highly respectable citizen—he obtained £5 from the hotel licensee. After working for a short time at Queenstown he went to Lawrence and obtained a cheque for £3 by again falsely pretending he was his twin brother. The next day he stayed at the Middlemarch Hotel, where he obtained three sums of money totalling £3 Os Od from boarders by saying that he had an account in the Post Office Savings Bank and would draw some money the next day. That night he stole two bottles of beer from the room of another boarder, and left on December 8 without paying his board. While on his way to Dunedin he borrowed £1 10s from the bus driver, telling him that the licensee of Middlemarch Hotel was keeping £ls for him and he would -be returning there in a few days. The magistrate, who said that Pearson had previous convictions for theft and false pretences, sentenced him to two months’ imprisonment with hard labour on each of the two charges of obtaining £3 and £5 by false pretences, and the charge of stealing £7, the sentences to be cumulative, and convicted and discharged him on the other charges.