Nine months' hard labour for theft from warehouse

Hertfordshire Mercury, 15th February 1913

Transcript

John Edmund Kensit (40), a traveller, Arthur William Goddard (39), a carman, John Knapp (39), a bricklayer, Charles Nichols (30), a greengrocer,  and Edmund Harris (26), a fishmonger, all pleaded guilty to being concerned together in feloniously breaking and entering the warehouse of Henry J. A. Garrett, at Waltham Cross, and together stealing fourteen rolls of cloth, fourteen jackets, seven skirts, and other articles of clothing, on January 22, 1913.  Kensit also acknowledged a previous conviction.

Mr Forrest Fulton said that, although four of the men had no previous convictions recorded against them, “they appeared to have embarked on a career of crime together” because, at the present time, they stood indicted at the next Central Criminal Court in respect of five separate offences.

These other offences were:-

  • On January 11th, 1913 the gang broke into a house in Chingford and stole property to the value of £118.
  • On January 17th, 1913 they broke into a pavilion at Tottenham and stole £10; the same day they broke into a cricket pavilion at Walthamstow and stole property valued at £13.
  • On January 18th, 1913 they stole articles to the value of £30 at Wood Green.

Detective Inspector Tritton said that Kensit was a man of very superior education, and one of the best men in England in his trade. He was looked upon as an expert in his trade and had earned “no end of money in his time”.  The other four were “men of inferior education and had been led astray by Kensit”.

The learned Judge, in sentencing Kensit to nine months’ hard labour and the other four men to six months, remarked that he was not taking into account the other charges that were pending against them.

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