[Editor: This article, regarding a case of fraud (involving marriage), was published in The Telegraph (Brisbane, Qld.), 12 December 1916.]
The following appeared in our Second Edition yesterday.
Marriage trap.
Bride robbed and deserted.
Melbourne, December 11.
A man entrapped a young woman into marriage and secured £200 of her savings and immediately disappeared.
The marriage took place last Friday. The victim informed the police that a matrimonial advertisement, in which the man represented himself as a respectable widower, of steady and sober habits, brought about the meeting. The woman, who was employed in a drapery establishment, and had saved £472, answered the advertisement.
After the ceremony they drove to a house at Carlton, which he said was to be their home, temporarily. He suggested pledging their future happiness over a glass of wine. It is thought that the wine was drugged, for immediately after taking it, the wife fell into a deep sleep. On waking some hours later she found that her husband had disappeared.
The circumstances of the affair bear a striking resemblance to the methods employed about two years ago by a middle-aged man who, playing upon the credulity of women possessing means, went through the form of marriage with several of them and after manipulating their banking accounts, disappeared.
Source:
The Telegraph (Brisbane, Qld.), 12 December 1916, p. 2
Also published in:
The Week (Brisbane, Qld.), 15 December 1916, p. 14
Editor’s notes:
means = resources, riches, wealth; a significantly large or abundant income or wealth (e.g. a man of means; a man of independent means; he was living beyond his means)
[Editor: The original text has been separated into paragraphs.]
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