20 -
same had been signed by me".
113
t seems hardly credible that forged vouchers
should be passed by the examination branch and it would
seem more probale that, if the fraud was effected by
means of forged vouchers, the vouchers and cheques may have been slipped onto the Colonial Treasurer's table
by some employee in the reasury. This would not be
an impossibility.
Ι.
L
n the same way, an employee of the Treasury might
have been able, without attracting suspicion, to abstract
the signed cheques with the supporting vouchers from those waiting sorting and distribution on the Registry clerk's desk. The supporting vouchers would presumably
be taken away and destroyed at once.
-
Each of the three cheques bore the date 30th
ecember, 1927, and on this date a great volume of work passed through the Treasury and 153 cheques were signed
On the previous day 287 cheques had been signed. The perpetrator of the fraud chose what is probably the busiest time of the year in the Treasury and at such
a time the possibility of bogus documents being passed
as genuine certainly would be increased. The officials
concerned would have little time for a leisured scruting
of the mass of matter passed to them for signature.
'esser has no recollection whatsoever of signing
these three cheques, and affirms that his signatures are forgeries. He states that at the end of December
he was particularly looking out for large cheques for
contractors as it might have been necessary to transfer funds to the General Account, Mr. Messer is on the
Tenders Board and all the contractors on extensive works