SUPREME COURT.

Taranaki Daily News, 3 August 1917, Page 3

SUPREME COURT.

AN ACQUITTAL. By Telegraph.—Press Association. Timaru, August 1. The short calendar at the Supreme Court was concluded to-day with the principal case. Roger 1\ Patterson, formerly stationmariter at Albury, and transferred to Coalgate in November last, was charged with endeavoring to obtain £2 14s from the Department as removal expenses, by submitting as a voucher for that amount what purposed to be a receipted lump sum account of 0. A. Clark, hotelkeeper, of Albury. The Department a;?ked for details, and- Clark being seen about these by ail officer denied that he had received the money, and denied signing a receipt for it Patterson was therefore charged with forgery, littering, and attempting to obtain money l>v false pretenses. His defence was that he and his family did not stay at the hotel for two days, but with a railway ganger, to whose wife lie paid fl and gave the man a valuable gun ; that he 'Was entitled to collect his expenses as for staying at the hotel, but could not then submit a voucher from the ganger because a regulation forbade a railway man increasing his income from other sources, and Clark assisted him to get a refund by giving him ai! estimate of the cost and sigmn!; it as a paid account. Clark admitted jgiving the estimate, hut denied receipting it. Two experts for the Crown said the signature was unlike Clark's, while two for the defence said it was undoubtedly Clark's. The jury returned a verdict of not guilty on all counts.