KNOCKED SENSELESS

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 3, Issue 700, 28 November 1933, Page 5

KNOCKED SENSELESS

(Press Assn.-

keeper of service station struck while usjng telephone DIFFERENCE OVER BENZINE

-By Telegraph — Copyright).

Hamilton, Monday. A strange assault upon a y.oung married man, John Barton Elliott, in charge of a petrol station at Hillcrest, has been reported to the police. It is stated that two men visited the station on Sunday evening and asked for some benzine. There was some trouble about the payment for the benzine and Elliott went to the telephone to ring up his employer, who was in another petrol station about three-quarters of a mile nearer the town. It was while he was telepboning, he alleges, that he received a Jblow on the head. Mr. E. Morris, who was in the other service station stated this morning that he answered the telephone and heard John Elliott say in an excited voice, "There are two blokes here — " then the receiver dropped on to the floor or bench and he could not get a reply. He immediately telephoned the police and asked a customer he was serving to go down and see what was wrong as he could not leave his petrol station. He then rang Mr. L. Sargent, who has a service station near the one in which the alleged assault occurred. Mr. Sargent immediately went to the scene and found Elliott lying unconscious on the floor of the office. A doctor was summoned and Elliott was removed to the Waikato Hospital where his condition to-day was reported to be satisfactory. There was about £15 in cash in the till at the time hut it was not disturbed . A piece of hardwood about 2ft long and llins square was found in the office, it being alleged that this was the weapon used in the assult.