The Sun. — 1845-08-06 (London, England)

WORSHIP-STREET. Two men named James Thompson and Wm. Cunnington were placed at the bar before Mr. Broughton, charged on suspicion of having stolen two valuable sporting dogs, the property of Mr. Burnell, a licensed victualler, at King's cross. It appeared from the statement of the prosecutor that on the night of Wednesday last his back premises were forcibly entered. and two sporting dogs, a setter and pointer of the value of twenty guineas, were stolen from their kennels. He immediately gave information to the police and caused handbills to be widely circulated, offering a reward of Si. for their restoration and detention the thieves, but heard nothing more respecting t',em until the preceding afternoon, when the prisoner called upon him and stated that he had seen the dogs in the possession of two men in Nelsonstreet, Bethnal-green, awl would point him out the house to which they had been taken, but .enjoined him to be very quiet and cautious, or the animals would be carried off without a chance of their recovery. He accordingly repaired to Nelson-street with the prisoner, whom he left at the end of the street, and proceeded to the house in which he said the animals were secreted, and was there answered by an old woman, who, on being questioned, declared that they had been carried away at three o'clock that afternoon, but that he would. find Mr. Cunnington, the landlord, at an adjoining publichouse, where he would obtain further information. After an ineffectual search for Cunnington at every public-house in the neighbourhood, he returned again to the house, and was answered by another woman, who denied all knowledge of the dogs, but her daughter, who was standing by during the conversation, gave him a private signal to follow her, and immediately led him into a room down stairs, in which there was a trap door, communicating with the cellar. On raising the flap he saw the two dogs coupled together in the cellar, and having descended a ladder and unfastened them, he was making his way through a small door into the back yard, when the woman he had last seen began screaming out " Murder," at the same time dropping the trap, and fastening the door of the yard to prevent his egress. After several ineffectual attempts to get out, he was at length obliged to scale a wall into another yard, and make his way into the street, with the dogs, through an adjoining house. He then returned to the spot where he had left the prisoner Thompson, with whom he made an arrangement to call at his house and receive the 5/. reward, but in consequence of a subsequent communication from the police, on his arrival at the time appointed, he gave him into custody. Sergeant Price stated that on the preceding night the prisoner Cunnington called at the station-house, and after expressing himself anxious to communicate all be knew about the transaction, said that a quantity of household furniture belonging to a person named Harrison had been left at his house with a request that he would take care of it, and that shortly afterwards the two dogs were brought by a wan who stated that they were also Harrison's property. Witness felt it his duty to detain Cunnington in custody, and the prisoner Thompson was shortly after brought to the station, when the other prisoner immediately charged him with being the man who had brought the dogs to his house under the above circumstances. Police-constable Burcham, H 58, stated he had ascertained the man Harrison, alluded to by the prisoner, was a notorious dog-stealer, and that he had surreptitiously removed his furniture to the house in Nelson.street to defraud his landlord. The prisoner Cunnington was not known to the police, but the other prisoner had only recently undergone twelve months' imprisonment on a conviction for felony. In their defence, both prisoners denied all knowledge of the robbery ; and Thompson said that he had been employed to convey the dogs to the house by two men, who gave him some halfpence for his trouble. Mt. Beoue neon said that he considered the evidence against the prisoner Thompson was altos/ether incompatible with his innocence ; he would, therefore, remand him for further examination at a future day ; but as he had some doubt as to whether the other prisoner had received possession of the dogs with a guilty knowledge, he would accept bail for the latter's appearance.