RESTAURANT ROBBERS.

NZ Truth, Issue 91, 16 March 1907, Page 4

RESTAURANT ROBBERS.

A TRICKY TRIO COME TO

GRIEF.

There is not a restaurant-keeper m Wellington who is : not the victim pi thievish who purloin .knives, forks, spoons, serviettes, m fact steal anything worth stealing, just for the sake pf stealing, and it can hardly be wondered at that these same restaurant-keepers express their intention * of sending .the first png they' pinch up skyrocket high. This opportunity , was afforded the keeper of the Silver Grid on Tuesday last, at the S.M.s Court, wlveh three nashly-dressed r smart and impudent young men, named Joseph Archibald Hamilton Blair, Alfred Joseph and James Hughes,, were charged- with having , on the * previous evening , stolen a bread-knife, valued at Is 3d, the property of James Fairway. The smarties went into the Silver Grid about 11 o'clock on Monday night for supper, and after they had guzzled a bob's worth they inarched off, and an old gent, who had kept his eye oh the trio informed one of the waiters that .. if he looked he would find a bread-knife missing Arthur Morse was the waiter, and he, lost no time on getting on the thieves' track, and shadowed them up Cuba-street, along which the hoodlums were flashing the knife, where Constables O'Connor and Scott, at Morse's instiigiati'on,. stopped them, arid accused them of the theft. The thieves denied all knowledge of the knife, and expressed themselves as not being such fools as to do such a thing ; but as the said knife was found- up Blair's sleeve they were made to appear, and no. doubt felt •themselves, bigger fools than ever. They, were promptly locked up at Mount Cook, and- the trio appeared very subdued before the Beak, who gave them a fatherly talking to, and as nothing was previously known against them, he convicted and discharged the thieves and ordered them to pay 12s costs. ________