A TTEMPTED BLACKMAIL

Otago Witness, Issue 2814, 19 February 1908, Page 19

A TTEMPTED BLACKMAIL

VOX VELTHEBI CONVICTED. SENTENCE OF TWENTY YEARS. LONDON. February 11. At the Old Bailey Yon Veltheimdenied the charge of blackmailing pieferred against him. He testified that he simply 1 demanded what was piomised to him when he arranged with the late Barney 1 Barnato the details of the plot to cause a split among the Boers by means of a pseudo-Boer revolution in 1897 and to depose President Kriiger in fa\our of some other prominent Boer. This would, he said, h«\\e obviated war and enab'ed ■ Mr Barnato to make huge Gums by stock I jobbing on the eve of the revolution. February 12. At the Old Bailey to-day the hearing of the charge ot attempted blackmail preferred against Yon Veltheim w\w continued. v The accused was sevoMlvcio-s-«rami,'eiJ| and Mr Joel was recalled to prove that the prisoner's version of the interviews with - Barney Barnato was ineon&iotcnt ! with t'-'e facts. | Yon Veltheim has been sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment on the charge of attempting to blackmail Mr Solly Joel. I February 13. The jury was absent for 20 minutes. ! Inspector Pentin, after the verd'et. gave Yon Veltheim's history. According to police accounts, he had been in various countries. His real name was Kurtz, and his father was a forester. The prisoner had a bad character from childhood. He was a sailor in the Geiman navy in 1880. but deserted the .same year. He was suspected of stealing his captain's gold watch and seal bearing the family ciest. The captain's name was Van Veltheim. Later the prisoner served aboard a British merchantman. In 1886 he went to Fremantle and Perth, where in 1887 he married Maria Yearsley. He then went to Capetown, and hie wife went to England and became acquainted with a gentleman whom the prisoner, on rejoining his wife, attempted to blackmail. He was told that the matter would be placed in the hands of the police, but he continued to write threateningly. Yon Veltheim next bigamously married, defrauded, and deserted several women. He obtained £1500 from one. H© underwent a supposed secret marriage with a young Ameiican lady at St. Cloud, one of his friends on that occasion personating a priest. Later the prisoner obtained trom a German widow, whom he previously knew and whom he promised to marry. £2800 to invest on her behalf. On finding that he had squandered the money she committed suicide. The prisoner seived in the Cape Mounted Police, but was lequested to resign. He then beg.in to blackmail the Joels. He was acquitted on a charge of murder, but was expelled for blackmailing. L.itcr on he rai.sed half a million kroner on a pretence of being able to uneaith the late Mr Kruger's buried tieasure, amounting to £5,000,000. The prisoner frequently interrupted the inspector in the course of his narrative, and shouted that the statements were all lies. He told Mr Phillimoie in a final speech that the plot story was true. He must cover people, and he did co now, although he was found guilty. Veltheim stated that he had not intended that the wretched letters signed '• Kismet "' should lme been taken, seriously. He was not such a fool as to think that such letters would produce money. Hi 6 conscience was clear on that point' Mr Barnato was not the principal man in the scheme wherein he ai&ked his assistance, but one of a number. He had begged the late Mr Woolf Joel's pardon for the Kismet letters, and Joel forgave him. He had been tried for Joel's murder, but w.vs acquitted. Thank God, he was not tried by a British jury, but by men who did not measure everything in tefm& of pounds, shillings, and pence. They had acquitted Him because they knew he was innocent. He had risked his life rather than betray the names of those in the plot to the Boer Government. He had never got money from" women.

Mr Justice Phillimore, in emphasising his statement that Veltheim. was guilty of one of the most serious of crimes, declared that the punishment must be equally preventive.

The prisoner was stunned on hearing the sentence (20 years). The Times describes Veltheim as € very dangerous scoundrel. The othel newspapers are equally satisfied with th< action of the jury and the judge. February 14. The wardens at Wormwood Scrub( Prison describe Yon. Veltheim as i brokendown man, dasfed, and in a semi- | collapsed condition. i