Stockton Herald, South Durham and Cleveland Advertiser. — 1890-07-26 (Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, England)

CILLEGE OP FRAUD.  In the warrant the defendant was charged that, "about the month of October, 1885, he feloniously did aid, abet, counsel, and procure one John Harrison to do and commit a certain felony, by him then committed; that is to say, that he, the said John Harrison, then being employed in the capacity of a clerk or servant to the Onward Building Society, feloniously and fraudulently did embezzlc and steal the sum of £l,BOO received by him on account of his said masters, and contrary to the form of the statute in such ease made and provided." Mr Barron said the first item on which the charge was made was one connected with the chairman of the Society. In October, 1885, Mr Mossom repaid to the Society a sum of £l,BOO, or thereabouts, and that sum was appropriated by the late Mr Harrison to his own purposes with the assistance of the defendant. Mr Robson spoke to finding a letter on the table in the directors' room, and a memorandum giving full particulars of the frauds. ' The total of the frauds was £45,151 Us 9d. The I ease was remanded for a weffir, bail being granted lin personal security of £2OO, and two sureties of £lOO each. On the 14th the case was adjourned again until the 20th. In tho meantime the shareholders had held meetings to consider the position of the Onward Building ' Society, and what course should be adopted Iwith regard to its future. It was resolved to carry on the Society on a scheme of reconstruction I drawn out by Mr Peat, and an amended scheme lis now in operation. On the 20th the case of atI tempted suicide was completed. Mr Jaynes, who defended, appealed to their Worships to consider Ithat the defendant had already brought sufficient punishment upon himself, and simply to order I him to come up for judgment when called upon, I which was the course usually adopted in such MM. The Magistrates, however,  COMMITTED THE DEFENDANT FOR TRIAL, the same bail being granted as before. The charge of fraud was then proceeded with. Mr Barron said There were a number of charges on which he had to proceed against the prisoner. The first was one of having stolen a sum of £296 19s 9d, the money of the Onward Building Society, on the 23rd November, 1888. He said that between 1.36,000 and £37,0300 had been prevented from entering the coffers of the Society by fraud, and about £7,000 0r.£8,000 hadbeen abstracted from them in The frauds, of which he ifilr Barron) could not help saying, so far RE the disclosures of the books showed, Mr Dennison was the author and originator, were effected wih  Tll2 MOST ITXTRAORDINLEY  and the accounts were manipulated in a most clever and masterly fashion, so that it was almost impossible to earmark many of the sums which had not been allowed to go into their legitimate channels. Fcatunately, however, in the interests of justice, it was possible to trace some of the RA1212 of money into Mr Dennison's hands. The law said that the person who received money for ' another, and appropriated it to his own use, stole that money. Hs should prove that certain sums had been received by Mr Dennison, and produce his own receipt for them in black and white, which Mr Dennison had jailed to enter into the subscripticm book, so that clearly at the time he received these moneys he intended to apply them to some purposes, presumably his own. There was