Mr X, a holy man and Garda Moroney...

AN incredible story from 1971 and I wonder does retired garda Brian Moroney remember it.

It was a court case involving a ‘ holy man’ who performed a series of tricks including making an adding machine rise mysteriously from an office desk to force a young accountant to hand over £50, Drogheda Court was told.

The Dublin based ‘ holy man’ was charged with demanding the money with menaces and with stealing the money from a Mr. X. He pleaded not guilty.

Superintendent Michael Bohan said that the case was rather unusual and the first of its kind that he had come across. “Mr. X is a rather shy arid retiring person and is very aware of the publicity that this case will get. He has asked me to request that the Press, when reporting the case, should refer to him as Mr. X.”

The ‘ holy man’ came into the office where Mr X worked. He took a piece of paper from his pocket and told the witness to write down the ages of his mother and father, his girlfriend, himself and any other lucky number under 10. The witness put the paper in his pocket and the ‘ holy man’ guessed all the ages correctly.

Mr. X went on: “I became frightened of him at this stage. He told me he had flown in from London a few days previously and said he had brought much luck to people living in Britain. Many of them had won the pools he claimed.’

He said he was collecting money for charity and asked for £50 or the witness would have bad luck.

‘I had been doing my wages when he came in and there was an adding machine on the desk. He looked at it and it rose several inches off the desk. I took out my cheque book and wrote him a cheque for £50,’ the man stated.

“I wrote the cheque with my right hand but later in the day on the advise of Garda Brian Moroney, I decided to have the cheque stopped, Two weeks later, I fell down the stairs at home and injured my right arm.’

Garda Brian Moroney said that when he went to the office of Mr. X he was frightened looking and very distressed. He arrested Singh outside the Ulster Bank in West Street, waiting to cash a cheque.