Natives to be Tried on Robbery Charges

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 966, 8 May 1930, Page 10

Natives to be Tried on Robbery Charges

ASSAULT ALLEGATIONS ONE GAOLED FOR THEFT Two Maori labourers were committed for trial in the Supreme Court when, in the Police Court this morning, they pleaded not guilty to allegations of robbery with violence, and breaking and entering. One accused pleaded guilty to three theft charges and was sentenced to imprisonment for six months. The victims of the alleged assaults told stories of blows received on the head in City Hotels and subsequent robbery. The accused were William Thomas, aged 21, of Whangarei, and Rangi Harawana, alias Benjamin Williams, 22, of Whakatane. It was Thomas who was sentenced to six months' imprisonment on the first of three charges of theft. He at first pleaded guilty to two, but Detective-Sergeant Kelly informed Mr. P. K. Hunt, S.M., later that Thomas admitted all three charges. They were the theft of a pair of shoes and a cardigan, valued at £3 on April 5 from Robert Harris, the theft of dungarees valued at 2s 6d on April 3, and the theft of a pair of motor-cycle overalls, valued at 10s, on March 26. Thomas was convicted and discharged on the two latter counts. Thomas and Williams pleaded not guilty to robbing John Francis Ford Anderson with violence on March 29 and to breaking and entering the house at Mangere of Hop Wing Dee, stealing £3 3s on April 8. Harawana Pleaded not guilty to robbing Henry Joseph McKeown, and the two accused were committed for trial on these counts. “I spent three days in the hospital,” said Anderson, a master mariner, residing at Winchester Street. Newton, and the first witness called against the accused. ‘‘l was in the Victoria Hotel about two o'clock in the afternoon, when a native approached me and asked me to buy drinks for his friend and we stayed at the hotel until nearly and we stayed at the hoteluntil nearly closing time. I was sober and one of the Maoris offered to get me a taxi to go to the Kmpire Hotel. The two of them pushed their way into the taxi after me.” IN VACANT SECTION Anderson said he was assaulted in the lavatory at the Empire. Hotel. He was hit- on the head and, when he recovered consciousness, found himself lying in a vacant section with £1 of the £2> 10s which had been in his possession missing. '*l was bleeding from the left eye and the left ear, and my clothes were saturated with biood,” continued witness. “I met a constable and was taken to hospital, where I spent three days.” Anderson identified Thomas as one of the Maoris, and said a hat which was produced in Court was the one he was wearing at the time of the assault. Constable R. J. McElhinney described the condition of Anderson when he found him, and Acting-De-fective Mills said the two accused had been brought down from Whangarei. They admitted statements made to the police there, and Harawana admitted that the hat concerned had been worn by a man they assaulted in Hobson Street. Dr. M. 11. Haycock said Anderson was suffering from concussion when he was admitted to the Auckland Hospital, and there w'as a fracture on the left side of the skull. There were also abrasions. A Chinese market gardener. Hop Wing Dee, of Favona Road, Mangere, gave evidence of having left for the City Markets about 6 a.m. on the morning of the day his residence was entered. He found the locks had been mashed off the porch door and the doors of two bedrooms. A sum above £2 10s was missing and the residence was disordered. “A person came behind me and ( aught me by the throat,” said McKeown, a tunneller, the victim of the assault alleged to have been made by Harawana. Witness said he was attacked in the lavatory at the Criterion Hotel and was struck on the jaw. He did not see his assailants. After he l ad heen thrown on the floor, he remembered someone searching his pockets. There were two men assaulting him. he said, and he was left in a dazed condition. He later complained to a constable of having been robbed of a pocket-knife, a tobacco pouch, and about 2s cash. Constable R. K. Mavley said he met McKeown. who had blood streaming down his head. There was a gash an mch long on the top of McKeown's '•ead and a gash on the side of the jaw. McKeown had not been able to say who assaulted him.