The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1870-11-12 00:00:00

A CAREER OF CRIME.

Sarah Edith Westwood, ithess Edith Florence
Howard, aged 3d, was brought up at the Weymouth
Police-court en Monday, and remanded on a charge of
obtaining go sie on false pretences from tradesmen.
Since she has been in the policsi.st.stion Superintendent
Viokery, of the borough force, has received letters
from various place. where she victimized tradesmen,
together with • record of the convictions against her,
in all of which the police describe her as a moat
artful imposter, upon whom a hag period of imprison.
ment would be considered a great boon to the public.
She informed the police that else had net been out of
priom n minßle week for the last seven years, and that
.fie seas more comfortable there than she had been at
any other place during the whole of that time.
From the letters received by Superintendent
Vickery the following particulars are gleaned relative
to her career from the year 1057, when she first seems
to have taken to diehotlest practice.:—
in the 19th of May she wise convicted at Cheltenham, and
underwert three months'imprlsonment for illegally pawntug
a watch, and a similar sentence for committing a larceny at
Denbigh In the same year. In October 1i57. she eras In the
oi.toily of the City of Glocester Police for an ofrnce cons-
inEted there, but was discharged. She next seems to have
turned her attention to the watering places on the coast, for
at nesting, she was convicted of f closiy, and sentenced under
the Criminal Justice Act to another three months' imprison.
silent After this she was to custody at Aberystwyth, in
Waltz, and eubsequensly at Tenby for obtaining goods
under false pretences—At the latter place to tne extent
of £4OO. In tmth these Instances, however, she con.
trivet' to keep herself out or the pale of the law.
In the year ISIM she appeared at ti eston-super Mare,
somersetshire, a here under the name of Westwood, she
succeeded in obtaining money and goods from trade,
people to the value of nearly .C3OO She rest visited Brig-
tol, and while there called at the residence of a medical
man for proferemal advice, hut sating advantage of Ms ab-
sence from home stole seas, of surgical Instruments. She
was arrested on this charge, but the magistrates, considering
her to be Insane, ordered her to be sent to an asylum, frosn
witch, however, she contrived to effect her escape. lu 1003
she paid Hastings another visit in February of that year,
and Was committed to a month's imprisonment for vagrancy.
In the July following she underwent imprisonment for 12
months more for larcener As soon as she was liberated
she visited Dover, and was there convicted of fraud At the
Borough Sessions at Brighton, on the 17:h of March, she was
sentenced to lei months' Imprisonment. At the expiration
of thisperlod she visited Ilampahlre, and war next heard of
as being In goal at Winchetter and Southampton, but for
what offences Is not stated.

chere is no evidence at present to show ho.v she
Spent her time for the next year or two, but in lit4.i9
she turned up at Blantiford, Dorsetshire, where he
was convicted for obtaining goods on false prett
and sentenced at the County Sessions to twelve months'
hard lahmr. She came out of prison on the 211th of
October, but had not been at liberty for a week before
she came to Weymouth, where she succeeded in again
victimising a ludginghouse•keeper and several trades-
men.