CRACKSMAN IN PARNELL.

Shannon News, 2 October 1925, Page 3

CRACKSMAN IN PARNELL.

DAYLIGHT REMOVAL OF ABSENTEE’S FURNITURE. BUT CHEQUE DIDN’T CONCLUDE COUP AUCKLAND, Last Night. A most impudent burglary was committed in broad daylight in St. Stephens Avenue, Parnell, yesterday, but fortunately the missing property was ,ali recovered at an auction mart. Now all that is wanted is the daring individual whose fertile brain devised a plan and carried it out with a coolness that completely deceived a wellknown auctioneering firm of high standing and quite lulled the suspicions of neighbours. The scene of this cool piece of impudence, which rather recalls Sydney, or some other large city, where smart “cracksmen” work, was a large house in St. Stephen’s Avenue, Parnell, owned by Air H. P. Kissling, general manager of the New Zealand Insurance Company.

At present, Mr and Airs, Kissling- are away in ' Sydney on a holiday visit. A well-known linn of auctioneers yesterday received a call from a welldressed young man, who gave out tnat he was Air Kissling’s son and said he wanted certain of the furniture in St. Stephen’s Avenue sold off during his father’s, absence. He asked /that the firm would send a representative up-with a motor lorry and the things would be pointed out to him. Accordingly the firm sent up a reliable man with a'motor lorry, arriving at the bouse which is quite close to the road and has neighbours on both sides of it quite near. The auction room employee was admitted by the young man, who was impersonating Mr Kissling’s son. They went in and uie young man led tiie auctioneering firm’s representative and his assistant into various rooms and pointed oui iu« in.Uii:, ,\t inch, he said, .was supernuous. Accordingly all the articles

penned out, and tney made quite a loan, were packed up and taken down to the auction mart in Queen Street. As Mr and Mrs Kissling were away in Sydney, some of the people in the street, who saw the furniture being removed wondered, but the thing was so openly done and the naipe on the lorry-looked so respectable, that they were completely' disarmed. Under the very noses of the Parnellites this cool, bare-faced ourgla; worked away, or rather he let the auctioneering man do the work,-while he directed and removed some of Mr Kissling’s most valuable household belongings. Anytow, the furniture was removed to the auction room and duly sold, but in the meantime, the fact that Air Kissling’s house had been entered had been discovered and the police ' were put on the trail. How the young burglar with this inventive turn of mind got in is not quite clear but a door at the back had one of the panes removed, or part of it taken out and it is probable that he was able to open the door through the opening. Fortunately, the burglar was , not clever enough to reap the reward of his misplaced ingenuity and risk. He evidently got wind that the game was up before he could be presented with a cheque. All the goods, were recovered at the auction mart, as they had not been removed, so everything ends satisfactorily with the exception that the young man who thought out this elaborate plan of getting rich CHRISTCHURCH W.M.C. VISITED. HAUL OF CASH AND CIGARETTES, CHRISTCHURCH, Last Night. Burglars entered the Working Alena Club and after thoroughly ’ ransacking the premises, decamped with several pounds in cash and a large quantity of cigarettes and tobacco. The intruders left some ten or fifteen sets of finger-prints on the white rafters and detectives are now following up clues in connection with the case.