The Sun.
London, England, 1870-09-10 00:00:00

SERIOUS CHARGE OF FRAUD.

Yesterday, at the Justice-room of the Mansion House,
Mr. James Stephen Tripp, sixty years of age, described
as an agent at 12, Clement's-lane, City, was charged
before the Lord Mayor on a warrant with fraudulently
obtaining, with one Richard Taylor, not in custody,
divers valuable securities, worth £3,200, the property of
William Parry, with intent to defraud. This was a most
remarkable case, and the present charge will not be the
only one preferred against the prisoner. Mr. George
Lewis, jun., solicitor, conducted the prosecution ; Mr.
Poland, barrister, appeared for the defence.
Mr. Lewis, addressing the court, said he had to insti:
tute a charge against the defendant of having committed
a most gross and flagrant commercial crime, by which not
only the prosecutor, Mr. Parry, an engineer, at Horn-
church, in Essex, but others of the public had been
grievously defrauded. The prisoner and the man Taylor
had carried on a business at 12, Clement's-lane, which
they described as a loan and banking agency, and of
which Tripp was stated to be the manager, although it
would be conclusively shewn that he was the real
principal, and that Taylor was a very willing partici-
pator in the commission of this fraud. The firm,
" Richard Taylor and C 0.," pretended to take
deposits, allowing good percentages, and to advance
money on securities, and these statements they
largely advertised in the newspapers. It would be shown
from a letter in the prisoner's own handwriting that in
July last the firm was hopelessly and irretrievably insol-
vent, and that when threatened with an adjudication in
bankruptcy they professed that they would not be able to
pay ls. in the pound. Notwithstanding this they still
made the same extravagant and false statements, and
issued in a circular the details of a new system by which,
for instance, an investor of £3,600 might have an annual
profit of £240 a year. By this the prosecutor had been
deceived, and it did not enter into his mind for one
moment that such statements could possibly be false.
He had previously sustained a loss of £7OO on various
stock transactions, and to retrieve this loss he expressed
a desire to buy under the new system Turkish stock fcr
£lO,OOO, the purchase money of which was to be advanced
by the prisoner and his partner. To this Tripp consented,
and the same day he handed what purported to be a con-
tract note to the prosecutor, by which he gave him to
understand that he had advanced 25,400 in payment of
the stock. Mr. Parry, in pursuance of the agreement,
sent him as a margin to cover the advance Stock of the
value of £3,200 ; and these were the securities of which
he had been defrauded. The advance in question was to
be repaid on the 15th of January next, together
with interest. Mr. Parry could never obtain
the numbers of the alleged bonds, and he even-
tually found that the whole transaction from beginning
to end had been a swindle, and that the prisoner and his
partner had converted to their own use the £3,200 worth
of securities which he had advanced. By this he had been
virtually ruined ; and he now applied to the Court to stop
such nefarious transactions from being' carried on in the
very heart of the City of London. Two young ladies had
been defrauded by the firm of several thousands, and
large amounts had also been obtained from other persons.
The importance of such an investigation could not be
overrated, and he (Mr. Lewis) hoped that it would serve
to put an end to systems fraught with considerable danger
to the commercial public.

That, in substance, was the statement of the solicitor
for the prosecution, and Mr. Parry gave evidence con-
firming it in the main particular.
The case was eventually adjourned.