The strange case of Wollongong's 'trouser burglar'

As far as Wollongong true crime stories go, not much is said about the trousers burglar, but he was busy enough in the 1940s to warrant the media giving him a nickname.

The burglar tended to focus on what is now considered the Wollongong CBD and surrounding suburbs.

In December 1940, the Mercury reported that he'd been at it in Smiths Hill, including a description of what he liked to do.

"His procedure is to enter a house in the early hours of the morning, enter the bedroom of the sleeping occupants and remove their clothing to the backyard, where he goes through the pockets," the Mercury reported.

While he tended to take cash and jewellery, he also had an odd fondness for a World War II item - petrol coupons.

The Mercury's story suggested he was quite busy - in one night the trousers burglar visited two houses in Kembla Street, one in Cliff Road and another in Wilson Street. In those thefts he took cash, jewellery - and yes - petrol coupons.

A week later he was at it again, stealing cash from the pockets of sleeping residents in several homes.

Not even Christmas Eve 1940 was reason to take a break; he decided to poke around Dr Goldie's house, though there was no reports of what was stolen.

The police didn't like the man for he was the only blemish on their perfect record for 1940; the Mercury reported the trousers burglar was the only crime not cleared off the books by the end of the year.

In early January he was back in the Smiths Hill area - and the media reports went for a bit of victim-blaming. They suggested he liked the area because "the inmates of residences are more likely to be careless of money, and leave it in their trousers pocket than those in other portions of the town".

But on January 9, it looked like the cops had nabbed their man, after he was foolish enough to try and steal a detective's pants.

Detective JS Brown had just arrived in town on the Monday to take over the Wollongong detectives' bureau and was staying in a room at the Flinders Inn on the north-western corner of Keira and Crown streets.

Just four days later on the Thursday at around 11pm, the detective got changed in his room, put on his dressing gown and headed for the communal bathroom.

Now, you would think a lawman would know better, but Brown left the door to his room open. When he returned, he saw the door to another guest's room closing and then found his pants had been stolen.

He went in to question the resident, a John William Dickenson, who insisted he had no idea what happened to the pants.

At that moment, a policeman was on patrol on Keira Street and found the pants on the footpath - directly below Dickenson's window. The cop then brought them up and handed over the pants.

Again the cops questioned Dickenson, who put himself in it by saying "I would not steal your trousers for a few lousy bob."

That was the worst thing he could say, because that was exact amount of money the detective had in his trousers.

Dickenson's defence was that he had been at the Dapto dogs on the night in question and went straight to bed after arriving at the Flinders Inn.

"I did not go into room 10 that night," he told the court. "I did not throw the trousers out the window. I did not touch them. I went straight to my room."

The judge thought it unlikely that a burglar was in the Flinders Inn at exactly the time Detective Brown arrived. He found Dickenson guilty and sentenced him to two months in prison.

Was he the trousers bandit? Well, he suggested he had been working in Darwin for months before arriving in Wollongong in January.

But on the other hand, there were no media reports of the trouser burglar's adventures while Dickenson was in jail.

So maybe he was the trouser burglar.