DANGEROUS FORGER

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 398, 6 December 1932, Page 3

DANGEROUS FORGER

| ASTON ISHING CAREER | STORY OF ACTIYITIES TOLD IN OLD BAILEY. ' MEMBER OF PROMINENT GANG. There recently was at large in Lon-. ' don a master forger whose work is so j clever that even victimised bank cus- .! tomers cannot tell his reproductions i from their own signatures. - An astonishing story of his activi- \ ties was told at the Old Bailey on j September 20, when one of his accom- j plies, Jack Thompson, aged thirty-one, ; was sentenced to five years' penal ser- j vitude for uttering forged cheques for j £249 and £178. | Detective-inspector Copley, of Scot- j land Yard, said there were six other j cases which Thompson wished to be ; taken into consideration. Thompson j was not the actUal forger. The Recorder (Sir Ernest Wild): j You have not got the actual forger? j Witness: No. It is difficult to get evidence against him. Thompson, continued the inspector, f was a prominent member of a gang of , cheque forgers who frequented the ; King's Cross and Caledonian road dis- i trict. At thq beginning of the year ■ the gang was from eighteen to twenty j strong and worked in sections. Let- ! ters were stolen from letter boxes and ' cheques abstraeted were used to foi'ge other cheques. These were preseuted j within half an liour or so of the theft. ■ Three other members of Thompson's : section of the gang had been sent to penal servitude in connection with the Bournemouth forgeries. Thompson got away and worked at a coffee stall ; in Westcliff, coming to London occa- ; sionally to utter the cheques. In the proceedings against Thomp- | son it was stated that in each cass a i cheque book was obtained in the name i of a bank customer. The forged cheque for £249 was presented at Gat- ; ford. Thompson was arrested and committed for trial, but abscortded : while^on bail last November. The cheque for £178 was presented ■ at a Shoreditch bank in May of this year, and Thompson obtained the ' money. ] The Recorder said Thompson was a member of a gang of very dangerous ■■ criminals.