A PURE "FAKE."

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 139, 8 December 1911, Page 2

A PURE "FAKE."

STORY OF A HOTEL ROBBERY EXPOSED. Auckland, December 2. At an early hour yesterday a boarder at James' Temperance Hotel, Whangarei, heard groans coming from the direction of the balcony, where a fellow-boarder named Allan Blackie, a young man about twenty-two years of age, slept. He made a hurried investigation and found Blackie lying on the floor with his hands bound behind him and a gag in his mouth. Blackie was released from his predicament and the police were sent for. On their arrival he made an extraordinary statement, and said that during the night some men had bound and gagged him and robbed him of £2O. Color was lent to the statement through the young man's empty purse being found lying in the yard at the rear of the building. Blackie, who has been managing a, small fancy goods agency in the town, persisted in the statement that he had been assaulted and robbed. The police were sceptical, as the material that bound the young man's bands was of such a ilimsy character that he should have had but little difficulty in freeing himself. Eventually Blackie confessed to Sergeant Moore that the matter had been prearranged .by himself. He said that he had some financial difficulties, and had planned the affair in the hope that it would solve them.