SERIOUS FRAUDS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 February 1942, Page 4

SERIOUS FRAUDS

ALLEGED IN LIVERPOOL WOMAN SECRETARY IN COURT BOGUS REPAIR CHARGES ALLEGED. HEAD OF FIRM COMMITS SUICIDE. (By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright) (Received This Day, 11.10 a.m.) LONDON, February 2. It was alleged in a Liverpool Court that £500,000 had been wrongfully obtained from the Government since the outbreak of war by means of fraud. Maud Tester, single, secretary to F. H. Porter, Ltd., was remanded till February 13. She was charged with having stolen £5,000 from Porter Ltd., and with having conspired with Councillor Charles Rowland Cla.ro and others unknown to obtain money by false pretences from Grayson. Rollo and Clover Docks Ltd., between September, 1939, and December, 1941. The prosecutor said Porter Ltd. had sub-contracts with the Admiralty, Ministry of Shipping and shipping companies for repair work on ships. The company employed a substantial number of boys and the authorities were charged men's wages for boys’ work on ships. When it became known that an investigation was in progress, 900 men disappeared from the company’s books. The prosecutor said Tester was alleged to have staled that fictitious wages sheets were made up weekly for men not employed by the company. Frederick William Porter, hea’d of the firm, shot himself in the head and died in hospital. The Coroner found that he committed suicide while mentally disturbed by business worries.