CHRISTCHURCH SHOPLIFTERS’ COOL CHEEK

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 83, 29 June 1927, Page 8

CHRISTCHURCH SHOPLIFTERS’ COOL CHEEK

WATCH AND MONEY STOLEN THREE SHOPS SUFFER (Special to THE SUN.) CHRISTCHURCH, Tuesday. By a display of cool impudence two women shoplifters made their get-away late yesterday afternoon from a city shop with a gold watch and £3 17s 6d in cash. A married woman and a girl aged about 18. both well-dressed, walked into the shop in High Street about 4 p.m., and asked to be shown a lady’s overcoat, which was displayed in the window. The assistant complied, and after inspecting the coat, the women departed without purchasing it. Then the assistant noticed that her bag which she had left in a recess in the fitting room was missing. She ran out of the shop in search of the woman and the girl. It appears that the two had gone into a passage-way near the door of the shop, where the lift-man saw the women empty the bag of its contents and hurry away. The assistant went to Cathedral Square, found the women and asked them to return to the shop. This they were quite willing to do. Near the door of the shop one of the women dropped a bag which was picked up by a passer-by and taken into the shop. The two women allowed the assistant to search them, and in their bag she found stockings, gloves and handkerchiefs that had tickets on them, and that were not even wrapped up. The assistant forgot that her watch had been in the bag and she did not miss it until last evening. At any rate she did not discover her money on the women, who left the shop after giving fictitious names and addresses.

It is believed- that two other shops in the city are also lamenting the visit of shop thieves.