The Great New Zealand Robbery

by Scott Bainbridge

  Further enquiries revealed that Mrs Ingram had regularly taken in boarders prior to the onset of her illness. One of those was Stewart Manuel, who was then doing a stretch in Mount Eden for forgery. His cell was just along from Nash’s. Prison sources reported that Manuel was a big-noter and regularly boasted of knowing a safe house. When he was interviewed, he denied knowing anything about the escape, but it was clear this was not the case. There was no other way Nash could have known about this house.

  After flogging the bike, Nash seems to have cycled right out through the front gates of the Colonial Ammunition Company and along Normanby Road to 166 Dominion Road, a mere 1.2 miles (2 kilometres) and an estimated eight minutes’ bike ride away. He may even have biked merrily past police heading towards the prison. He wouldn’t have been easily identifiable. His prison attire of dark charcoal trousers, Harris tweed coat and denim shirt could easily be mistaken for factory clothes, and it was unlikely anyone would have thought to look for a prison escapee on a bicycle. The amount of rubbish left behind suggested Nash may have remained there for one or two nights. From there, the trail stopped cold. Where the hell did he go?

  — — —

  By now, Nash had been at large for over a week. It had been anticipated that he would be caught easily and it frustrated the authorities that there was absolutely no clue as to his whereabouts. More galling still was the fact that he had probably been reunited with the stolen money. The constant publicity was a double-edged sword, because the sheer volume of false leads—whether tendered in good or bad faith—was diluting the police effort.

  Glen King was a young Australian who had been dumped by his girlfriend. Heartbroken, he decided to leave Sydney and hop across the ditch to start afresh. He arrived in Auckland on the Wanganella on 2 February and on the Monday, after two nights in a hotel, he presented himself to the Radnor Flats. The proprietor was polite but seemed cautious and, now that King thought about it, he had received a lot of stares as he carried his suitcases along to Waterloo Quadrant. How odd New Zealanders were, he mused.

  Throughout the afternoon, King tried striking up conversations with other tenants, but they all seemed ill at ease and soon made excuses to leave. It was all faintly baffling, but the reason became clear a little under a week later. On Sunday afternoon, King was lying on his bed when detectives burst through the door. He was forced on to his front, handcuffed then hauled out in plain view of the other residents, thrown in the back of a police car and driven to Auckland CIB. King almost shat his pants. He couldn’t work out what crime he was supposed to have committed.

  Down at the station, detectives demanded he prove his identity. He was readily able to confirm he was Mr Glen King from Sydney. A detective thrust a photograph of the wanted fugitive Trevor Nash in front of him. Even King had to admit he bore a striking resemblance to Nash. Once they were satisfied he was the innocent victim of mistaken identity, the policemen were apologetic. They explained that one of the Radnor Flats tenants had noticed him checking in and was convinced he was Nash. King saw the funny side, but vowed to find alternative accommodation just as soon as he was free to leave.

  Two days later, an office typist telephoned police saying Nash was currently standing right outside her office near the corner of Pitt Street and Karangahape Road, talking with a young woman. Detective Constable Brien requisitioned a car and raced immediately to the scene. As he closed in he could hardly believe his eyes. Trevor Nash was indeed standing there, large as life, and apparently without a care in the world. Brien walked right up and manhandled him into the car. The man began crying and showed him his papers: it was the hapless Glen King, and it was the second time in three days he had been mistaken for Trevor Nash. Brien muttered a half-hearted apology and helped straighten out his suit. King looked along the road but the girl he had been trying to impress was long gone.

  ‘Bugger this!’ he exclaimed to Brien. ‘Everywhere I go, people think I’m bloody Nash! I’ve had enough! I’m going back to Australia.’

  Several people reported seeing Nash disguised as a priest at the Frankton Railway Station, where he was heard to be buying a ticket for Taumarunui. Nash had spent time there in his younger years so the notion that he might head there to hide out was taken seriously. The Herald ran four versions of Nash’s photograph, including one disguised as a priest.38 Senior Sergeant Anderson and his constables in Taumarunui scoured the township high and low without result.

  — — —

  New Zealanders love an underdog, even a criminal one. There is a broad anti-authoritarian streak in the Kiwi psyche, and the longer Nash remained on the run, the more his popularity grew. The story of how he had escaped and his resourcefulness in continuing to evade capture was a Boy’s Own-type adventure. He was in danger of becoming a folk hero. The police explicitly worried that sympathetic supporters might even assist in his evasion, if they weren’t already doing so.

  Wherever he was hiding, it was thought he wouldn’t be able to resist calling in at home. The escape brought unwanted attention upon Maria Nash and the wider Nash family. Although detectives believed Maria when she said that she and Nash hadn’t been on good terms prior to his escape, it was thought he might make an attempt to come back home at some point, if for no other reason than to see his daughter, who had been born three months after his incarceration.

  Peter Faulkner was one of the constables tasked with executing the search warrant on Nash’s home back in 1957. Four years later, he had risen to the rank of detective and remembers glancing in whenever he had cause to drive past.

  [Eight] Bridge Street, Papatoetoe became an address well known to all police. Every officer was instructed to slow down and take a close look whenever they happened to pass. I know I did a number of times, for quite a long period of time. It was probably the safest street in Auckland because there were a number of patrols daily, especially in those first few weeks.

  ‘God help you if your name was Nash back then,’ Tony Nash recalls.

  People gave you a second glance or avoided you altogether. We weren’t related to Trevor, but we lived in Papakura so got one hell of a hard time growing up. Things were pretty bad; the folks couldn’t get credit anywhere, and I was teased at school. We cringed whenever his picture was in the paper. We often wondered what it must’ve been like for his actual family.

  One who knew the answer to this question was Warren Nash, Trevor Nash’s nephew.

  My dad, Brian Nash, was Trevor’s older brother. We had a market garden at Convoy Lane in Otahuhu. We had glasshouses and open ground crops. Dad was basically as honest as you got then. Growing up in Otahuhu during that period was interesting. At Otahuhu Primary and Intermediate it was never an issue that I was aware of. Once I started Otahuhu College it became more of an issue. The deputy principal took a decided antagonistic attitude towards me. I remember the first day at school being asked by him in class if I was related to Trevor. After admitting he was my uncle, I was taken out of class and given a firm and long lecture about behaving myself, and not allowing my family to influence me.

  After Trevor made the headlines with his escape, Dad and Mum were slowly ostracised from the whole community. I remember friends of mine from primary school telling me they weren’t allowed to associate with me because their parents didn’t allow it and later girlfriends I made being told not to associate with me because of Trevor.

  There was never much discussion about Trevor at home, more of a decided desire to have nothing to do with him. Mum always felt sorry for Maria. I remember her and the girls visiting quite a few times while Trevor was inside. I know Dad refused to be drawn into any conversation about Trevor, other than to say he was a thieving little bugger.

  Our phone line, party line 828D, was monitored, any calls we made were delayed, but Dad found a way around. It was a manual exchange, and the procedure was to connect us with the number, then connect to the police. If whoever we were ringing was quick to pick up, we could give a message—‘We’ll be over Sunday’—t
hen hang up. Then the exchange would ring us back to tell us the call was now connected. Dad had a lot of fun with that.

  — — —

  Detectives realised the first thing Nash was likely to do was retrieve the stolen money from wherever it was stashed or whomever he had entrusted it to. As time dragged on, it seemed less likely he was going it alone. He must have been receiving assistance and was most likely paying off other criminals for his freedom. His funds would have been dwindling fast. Gus Parsons’ crew were closely monitored but nobody seemed openly flush with money. With all the publicity around the escape, the stolen money would be considered too hot to launder and he would therefore be forced to spend it.

  ‘I imagine that he is paying to be free,’ Police Commissioner W. R. Brown told the media. ‘You can’t live long in New Zealand and lie low like that without paying for it.’

  This was potentially one way of flushing him out. If stolen banknotes were found to be in circulation in any specific area, it could narrow down his possible location. This depended on banks and businesses remaining vigilant.

  On the Monday following his escape, an updated memorandum was issued to all banks and businesses reminding them of the serial numbers of the stolen banknotes and asking staff to resume their vigilance.

  Within days of the issue of the memorandum, bank managers from different banks and branches all around Auckland reported finding stolen notes. Detective Sergeant Irving decided to second in Government Analyst George Stace to examine any notes that were handed in that appeared to be new and artificially aged. Most of the notes presented for examination were worn and stained to an extent that even the government analyst could not positively connect them to the Waterfront heist. Stace conducted tests, but found stains to be mildew or the genuine patina of age that notes acquire through being handled by any number of persons over a period of time. Analysis seemed futile, and many of the notes uplifted for examination were destroyed—much to the displeasure of bank officials.

  On 15 February 1961, two £10 notes—4/F 875541 and 875559—were banked at the High Street branch of the Bank of New Zealand by an unknown depositor. Both notes were new and showing little sign of wear, although one had what appeared to be mildew staining, as if it had been stored for a long period of time, and the other bore signs of rust shade. Several days later 4/F 875512 was found at the Bank of New Zealand on Queen Street as part of a £3100 deposit on a property from a solicitor, whose client was unable to explain how this note arrived in her possession. It was decided that, four years on from the robbery, it was most likely these three notes had been in circulation for a number of years and hadn’t been identified in the period after Nash was arrested, during which bank staff relaxed their vigilance.

  The original 1956 memorandum describing the serial sequences of the stolen notes had been restricted to Auckland regional branches. Now that Nash was nowhere to be found, it was thought he might have left the Auckland region and would be passing the money somewhere else. It was therefore decided to widen the scope and the updated memorandum was sent to all banks around New Zealand.

  For a time, nothing happened. Then information was received that abruptly shifted enquiries to the South Island.

  CHAPTER 13

  FALSE TRAILS

  Initially, South Island police did not place much credence on the reports they began receiving of suspicious-looking men trying to palm off equally dubious-looking banknotes. Perhaps they didn’t consider it a genuine possibility that Nash would make his way south; it was more likely that he would seek to make his way across the Tasman from any one of the numerous North Island ports at which trans-Tasman shipping called. Many regarded Nash as an Auckland problem.

  Attitudes changed on 17 March, when a teller from the Lyttelton branch of the Bank of New Zealand telephoned local police to say that someone had just banked a £10 note, serial 4/F 874040, within the range believed to have been netted in the heist. When Senior Sergeant Bamber called, none of the tellers could describe or remember who banked it. Bamber and two constables spent the entire day combing Lyttelton’s High Street and checking local hotels for anyone matching Trevor Nash’s description. At that time, the Union Steamship Company had paid off 70 seamen and a large number were spending it up at the local hotels. All ships berthed at Lyttelton were checked, but police could find no trace of Nash.

  The 4/F note caused great excitement, and the local newspaper dined out for two weeks on the possibility that Nash was hiding somewhere in the South Island. There was no evidence to indicate the note was linked to the payroll heist, but it was definitely close to the known sequence. The article was widely read, prompting calls from a number of people from Christchurch and as far afield as Cromwell to report strange-looking, rough characters spending money in pubs or enquiring after beds in boarding houses, to the point where a local sergeant complained that just about every outsider was being considered a suspect by the public. And meanwhile, of course, hundreds of soiled or stained banknotes were being reported.

  There was a flurry of excitement further south in Dunedin when three people—independently of each other—claimed they had seen Nash hitchhiking near Waitati. Roadblocks were set up on all main roads, and rail and bus services were watched closely. The man in question was tracked to Christchurch and promptly detained as he was checking in to a hotel. He was hustled to the central police station for questioning for four hours and met by a reporter when he walked out. ‘He can keep his money! Imagine me looking like that bloke?’ muttered a bewildered transient named George McLaughlin. He sauntered off, saying the first thing he was going to do was get a haircut and shave.39

  On the same day the £10 note was found in Lyttelton, Paul Brooks saw Trevor Nash travelling on the Railway Road Services Bus from Christchurch to Hanmer. Brooks had noticed the man as he walked to the rear of the bus and thought he looked familiar. Then he clicked. The man seemed to be trying to sink back in his seat to avoid attention. At the refreshment break in Waikari, Brooks played amateur detective and engaged the man in conversation.

  ‘You’re a Brit, aren’t you, mate?’ Brooks asked him. ‘Same as me. Where you from, then?’

  ‘Oh, London. I’m a cockney, ain’t I?’ the man replied.

  Brooks knew he sounded nothing like a cockney. ‘I’m from Blackpool myself. I’m living down in Invercargill. What about you? You settled out here then, or just visiting?’

  ‘Visiting. It’s my third trip. Ship I was on just sailed into Invercargill Harbour,’ the man replied.

  ‘You must mean Bluff,’ Brooks said. ‘Invercargill doesn’t have a port.’

  ‘Never heard of Bluff.’ The stranger shrugged.

  It was time to get back on board the bus. Brooks didn’t say anything more in case he spooked the man, but he resolved to call the police as soon as they arrived in Hanmer.

  When the bus pulled in, Brooks collected his bags and conversed with a man named James Fitzsimons. Brook asked where in town the hospital was located and Fitzsimons replied he was heading in that direction so offered to accompany him. The suspicious stranger called out, ‘Good luck!’ and strode off in another direction. Brooks noticed the stranger didn’t have any luggage except for two brown paper bags. He was wearing an overcoat that was too small for him, airforce blue in colour, and a dark shirt buttoned up to his neck with no tie.

  The next day, Brooks and Fitzsimons ran into each other in the Hanmer township and noticed the wanted poster on the wall of the post office. Both agreed the man who was on the bus was definitely Trevor Nash and they told local police. Although both men were patients of the Queen Mary Mental Hospital, their claims were taken seriously and CIB were brought in to establish the likely locations Nash could be holed up. Constable Gallagher informed CIB that a murderer named Phillip Otto had recently escaped while undergoing surgery at Burwood Hospital and hid in the area for a number of weeks before being recaptured. Otto was in Mount Eden Prison at the same time as Nash and may have given him a rundown on the Hanmer
area.

  Several days later, an Electricity Department employee reported that the vacant Duncan’s Creek Cookhouse 21 miles (34 kilometres) from Hanmer had been broken into and a tin of coffee and quantity of food stolen.

  Bob Loader was Lyttelton born and bred. After Police College, he returned to the small port town in the rank of constable. One of his first jobs involved the hunt for Nash.

  After that article came out in the Christchurch Star, we were inundated with all sorts of sightings. I remember a psychic contacted us adamant Nash was hiding out in the Port Hills. I spent my youth running up and down those hills and knew them like the back of my hand. There was a tunnel in the side of one of the hills where there was a type of gun emplacement where they had stored petroleum, food and water during the war. Well, this psychic fellow was adamant Nash was holed up there. My senior sergeant at the time was Gideon Tait [later Assistant Police Commissioner from 1974 to 1975] who did not suffer fools, but agreed to humour this fellow. I was tasked with going up through these tunnels with police dogs. The idea was we would make our way through from the bottom to the top, where we would have a good look out over the whole area. Well, we didn’t find anything or anyone.

  There was the thought Nash was hiding out somewhere in town preparing to ring-bolt, which was a real possibility. Back in those days, Auckland had the Wharf Police, so they had sufficient personnel to check the wharves, but we had nothing like that down here. It was only those of us on the beat so it would have been relatively easy to slip through and get on board any vessel. We just did not have the manpower to patrol the ports all of the time. During that particular week a lot of the uniformed constables were directed to patrol the wharf area and check all passengers embarking. I recall a funny incident when another constable and I were walking along the wharf when we heard a splash. My mate said quite deadpan, ‘I heard a splash. It might be Nash with the cash.’ That was a longstanding joke.