UNIQUE CRIMINAL.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 270, 12 November 1923, Page 8

UNIQUE CRIMINAL.

MASTERTON SCORRINGE. SENTENCED IN SYDNEY. DESPERATE NEW ZEALANDER. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY, November 8. Masterton Charles Scorringe, halfk Maori, half-Spaniard, and desperate criminal from New Zealand, was sentenced to five years' imprisonment at , the Sydney Quarter Sessions last week, . on numerous charges of robbing Chinese while an escapee from gaol. I Scorringe has a remarkable career ot • j crime. Only once in his 23 years of > I crime has he robbed a European, and on , ; that occasion, just after his senational i escape from Parramatta last February, 1 he left a note of apology to the victims. '_ He courteously explained in the note ' that he was hard pressed by the police, 1 and wanted the clothes and money lie stole to effect his escape. Commencing at the age of ten in New Zealand, Scorringe has systematically robbed Chinese for the past 23 years. He i has always refused to tell what his reason is for robbing Chinese, but he has stated that Chinese in New Zealand were responsible for his first lapse when ' a boy, and has affirmed his determina- < tion to prey on them as long as he is < able. Scorringe's name is a by-word ' j among the Chinese of Sydney, and in i j 1 nearly every Chinese abode which the < detectives have visited they have found f the photograph prominently displayed on ' the wall. A Raid on the Chinese. | When living among tbe Chinese in . I New Zealand this criminal picked up an , ' extensive knowledge of their language, I _ habits and customs. Several hundred 1 robberies of Chinese' premises in Sydney j were carried out by him in the past ten _ years, the proceeds, mostly cash, amount- a ing to some thousands of pounds. From a the time be escaped from the prison __ escort _n February, until his recapture 0 about six weeks ago, he robbed more than forty Chinese premises, and ob- a tamed between £600 and £700. Of this a I sum only £8 18/(1 was recovered. n Of mixed Spanish and Maori parent- t,, j age, Scorringe is a criminal type in him- i_ self. He has rather a pleasant person- 0 ality, and the police describe him as „ "one of the best conducted criminals." n Before he was ten years old, Scorringe was committed to the Burnham Industrial School, near Christchurch. From there he escaped, and made his way to the North Island, where he was caught n and handed over to the custody of his a father. Just about this time he seems n to linvn first, come info ennt.net _ri.li tho --

.to nave lirst cotne into contact with the Chinese in Wellington, and formed that implacable hatred of the race which has led him to commit crime after crime against them. Early in 1903 he was first convicted at Wellington of breaking and entering Chinese premises, and was ■ sent back to the industrial school. In the next threi? years he escaped twice, and always went tq. Wellington, and robbed Chinese dwellings. Wellington I was the nearest approach to a China- ; town that he could find in the Dominion, J and it was a vicious criminal haunt. On the Trail in Sydney. For his last Burnham escape, Scorringc received twelve strokes of the birch, but that did not deter him in his vendetta against Celestials, for he finished up his criminal career in New Zealand by serving a two-years' sentence on ten charges of breaking and entering Chinese premises at Auckland. When he came out of the Auckland Gaol, in 1911, Scorringe sought wider fields in which to pursue his weird campaign. Robbery of a Chinese brought him twelve months' hard labour in Hobart the same year, and five years later he fell foul of the Sydney police. He was chased after robbing a Chinese in Kensington and fired on a sergeant when the latter drew near. Scorringe was caught later and received three years' hard labour. But no gaol sentence could deter him. As soon as he had served this sentence he was on the trail again. He was caught again in 1922, served short sentences, returned to the campaign, and early this year was sentenced to two years and seven months' gaol. It was while he was being taken to the Parramatta Gaol to serve this sentence that he made his sennational escape. iScorrings always worked alone, generally between (! and 10 o'clock in the morning, when he knew his Chinese victims would be out in their gardens or at the markets. He never carried any elaborate burglar"s kit, but simply hacked the safes open with whatever tool was handy. If he found a revolver while searching, he took it as a precaution, and threw it away when he was clear of the premises. (Scorringe was a champion runner, and has shown the detectives medals he won in New Zealand and Australia as a professional.