The jewel thief.

Walter Gabriel Rossiter’s jewellery and pawnshop was well known in Dunedin. There were definitely lots of pretty shiny things inside.
And it had caught the eye of a couple of thieves - including one who specialised in stealing jewellery.
Rossiter was in his shop on May 11, 1931, removing items from the display window to the safe just before midnight when two men came in.
Immediately one of them jumped the 73-year-old, punching him to the ground and then began to throttle him while the other man began snatching up rings.
Rossiter’s wife Jane came downstairs from their home above their George St shop and was knocked unconscious.
Across the street a watchmaker heard the noise and rushed over armed with a screwdriver and forced his way into the shop. One of the burglars rushed upstairs and jumped from a window but the other man was captured.
He turned out to be Thomas William Wilson.
In court, the judge called it a callous and brutal crime. In the six months before Wilson had stolen goods worth £4,791, of which £3,000 in jewellery had not been recovered, the proceeds of which, most likely, he hoped to enjoy when released.
Wilson was concerned in the theft of jewellery from Dawson's shop in George St, , theft of jewellery from W. J Paterson’s, and theft from R. S. Black and Son’s and the Hudson Fur Company.
Wilson in a long statement, which his counsel read to the court. In that he outlined his history from boyhood and his entry into crime, which he claimed was the result of his environment and association with “ old hands ” when he first went to gaol as a youth.
Wilson was sentenced to five years jail but he wasn’t there long - he escaped after complaining about stomach troubles, being taken to hospital and then simply walked out the front door.
It would be years later that it was found he had stowed away on a ship to America, where he couldn’t stop his criminal habits and was jailed for burglary - this time getting 15 years.
Wilson did a bargain with the American authorities - he would leave the country rather than serve out his time.
So in 1936 he arrived back in New Zealand aboard the Mariposa - called himself Mr W Henry.
The police weren’t fooled though and he was arrested, protesting that he had given up his life of crime.
A judge didn’t quite believe him and jailed him - adding a year to his sentence for his escape.
Wilson then went to the Court of Appeal claiming that the time spent after he had escaped should be counted as part of his sentence. It was a technical legal point that had to do with the fact that the warrant to detain him had run out and there was nothing in the law to say that he could be held past this point.
The Court of Appeal rather reluctantly agreed and his sentence came to an end in 1938.
Wilson then passed into history without further notice.
Rossiter however died a few years later and is buried in Andersons Bay Cemetery in Dunedin.​