Smart Arrest

Manawatu Times, Volume 65, Issue 3, 4 January 1940, Page 9

Smart Arrest

John Robertson, the well-known Middlesex cricketer, now War Reaorvo constable, was tho leading witness at a London Police Court against two men whom he and another constable had arrested in St. John’s Wood, after hearing mysterious noises in empty houses.

Samuel Trevor Lewis, aged 45, and Herbert Henry Hall, aged 34, wore found in a house adjacent to a highway for the purpose of committing a felony. ,Asked what they were doing in the house, Lewis was alleged to have said they were “after the rats” which a barrow man named Ginger had told them were there.

Shortly after 7 a.in. Constable Robertson said ho heard mysterious noises coming from an empty house at Boundary Road. Ho entered and searched, but found no one. He noticed, however, that lead piping had been torn away

from the wall aud that water was escaping. Four* hours later he agaiu heard knocking, and, looking up, saw accused at a top window of an empty house, Hall being ou the ledge. ; The men withdrew when they saw . they were observed, and were stopped *

as they were leaving tho house. ! Lewis called evidence to show that five months ago he obtained permission of the agents responsible for tho pro perty to take whatever he wanted from i it for his own house. ! The magistrate, Mr. Bernard Carai pion, K.C., said this was an impudent (

| defence, for obviously the permission u came to an end when Lewis ceased to i be a tenant of the agents. Many people, ho said, regarded tM» i as scrounging, but it was really theft, j and there was no other word far it. He -! fined accused 40s each, or 11 days’- i.m----t j prisonment.