A YOUNG MAN RUINED BY THE CHINESE LOTTERIES.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5360, 1 June 1878, Page 1 (Supplement)

A YOUNG MAN RUINED BY THE CHINESE LOTTERIES.

(From the Melbourne Daily Telegraph)

The urgent necessity for the suppression of the Chinese lotteries was never made more evident than yesterday, by means of a case in the City Police Court, in which a hitherto respectable young man, named Henry Hammond,- was charged with stealing £54 10s. Od. from the Melbourne Omnibus Company. The story of the prisoner’s offence was a sad one, though, unfortunately, not a new one, the defendant having gone wrong in much the same way as most of those who have been charged with this class of offence. He was. a junior clerk in the employ of the company, and was trusted with the charge of a large sum of money, and he was faithful to the trust reposed in him for nearly eighteen months. Quite recently he was seized with the gambling infatuation, and invested in the Chinese lotteries. Loss impelled him to dip deeper in the mire, and in order, as he no doubt thought, to recover himself, ho appropriated the money of the: company. -According to the evidence of Mr. Willcox, the head clerk in the company’s office, it ; was Hammond’s duty to receive money from the branch offices and pay it into the bank. On Wednesday week last he made out the pay slip to pay into the bank, but Mr. Wilcox unexpectedly took the money ta the bank,: and found that it was £2O short. On returning to the office Mr.-Wilcox confronted the prisoner, who confessed that he had taken the-’money. His cash was then examined,- and it was found to be £4 10s. 6d.; short, and on further, investigation,'it wai discovered that he ; had appropriated money; intended for tradesmen, amounting to £3O. . He was then given into the custody of Detective Edelsten, After' he was locked up, relations of the prisoner made good the money which he had stolen, and as it was apparent that lie bad acted dishonestly during the week only prior to his defalcations being discovered, it was thought that he should be dealt leniently with. The Bench, therefore, sentenced him to six months’imprisonment only.