BANKRUPT BUILDER.

Auckland Star, Volume LV, Issue 115, 16 May 1924, Page 7

BANKRUPT BUILDER.

MORRIS GIVES EVIDENCE. ASHAMED OF HIS FLIGHT. The trial of the ex-builder, George Morris, who was charged on four counts, under the Bankruptcy Act, was continued at the Supreme Court before . Mr. Justice Herdman. Accused gave evidence that he came to Auckland five years ago, and after ' working for three years as __ journey- a man, was a contractor for two years. The chief cause of his bankruptcy was ? the failure or delay of merchants to 1 deliver his orders, and a consequent ' ! insufficient pressure of work on all jobs. cl lln December, 1922, a trial balance Sl | showed that he was solvent, but con- n I tracts for houses for Messrs. Walker, * I Hodgson, Wake and Thomas sank his c | position. On the face of these con- *' tracts he believed now that he had not d allowed sufficient margin, and they wero a taken at too low a price. n Between January ana May nis receipts * were £5083, the amounts paid out * through bank accounts were £481, and cash payments amounted to £2042. ! Wages amounted to about £200 a week, hut up to April _7, 1023, all his wasres . within a margin of £15 were paid. On j his arrival at Wellington he had £4 15/, i and by working there he obtained money ■to go to Sydney. A trial balance com- ; pleted on May 8, the night he went j away, showed that his arrears amounted jto £2300. Asked why he went away accused I said be was at a loss to explain that. It was the only thing ho was ashamed c J of. He was certainly not in his right c senses. In Melbourne, at the time of his J arrest, he was working for a brick- 1 , layer. He concealed none of his assets « and paid away in wages practically the i whole of the £750 drawn from one > banking account. His losses accrued so \ quickly as to be unrealisable as they l went on. j In reply to Mr. Paterson (for the . Crown) he - said that he had £35 . [capital when he started business on , | Oiis own account, and later received , £300 which he had previously left with his mother in Australia, and put this , into the business. | Asked by His Honor and counsel what name he had given to people he had I lodged with or worked for in Wellington, ' I accused answered that he hadn't the slightest idea. No one with whom he ' was connected was interested in him ' sufficiently to ask his name. j Cross-examined further he denied I I living with a certain widow or corresponding with her, but he admitted that jwhen he went, to Melbourne she foi- , lowed him and they lived there together as Mr. and Mrs. Leslie Darris until his arrest. She had not handled any ol Ins money, nor received money from Mr. Finlay addressed the jury for the defence and the Court adjourned until to-day. His Honor, in summing up, reviewed the evidence at length. He said there was no proper explanation of any of the payments said to have been made by Morris. No books existed. But that was not the fault of the Crown: it was ithe fault of bankrupt. The man said that when he went away he left the books in his office, and that those books afterwards,dieappcared. The assignee took possession of all the property available, but he could not And any book-. If there was any discrepancy in regard to accused's statements about his disbursements of money, it was bankrupt's own fault. There was no direct evidence about the man having £10 in his pocket when he went away, of having concealed or fraudulently received even £10; but there was evidence from which the jury would be entitled to draw an inference. In regard to the charges of having contracted debts in April and May when he had no reasonable expectation of being able to pay, his Honor said that when these debts were contracted, bankrupt was already heavily in debt to these firms. Wag there any prospect in the mind of the accused that he could pay those debts? At that time, according to accused's own statement, his indebtedness amounted to £2300. He said he had gone to the bad to that extent between February and ' the end of April last year, a period of four months. The assignee fixed the deficiency at £3788. The jury must , assume that Morris had some knowledge of his own affairs and if he did not, then he ought to have had. If he got into a state of hopeless bankruptcy in three or four months, he ought to have known about his business. If he knew he could not pay these debts, as well as the preceding debts, he had committed an offence. The Crown alleged that this man well kncw_ he was hopelessly involved, and that be had contracted those debts without the slightest hope of paying them, and knowing he could not pay his other debts. As custodians (in this case, at least) of the business morality of the community, the jury, if they believed this, were bound to bring in a verdict of guilty. On the other hand, if they thought Morris was honest and had a reasonable expectation of paying his debts, they would find him not guilty. But they might find it difficult to think that, on the face of the facts that had been brought before them, they might think it was inconceivable tbat a man such as Morris, who had gone to the bad to the extent of £3788 in a few months, could not know the true situation. Then, why did he leave? He could give no satisfactory explanation of that, and the jury was entitled to infer that this man who disappeared—vanished into the nigbt, as it were—went to Wellington and subsequently to Melbourne, where he lived under an assumed name, and who did not know what names he lived | under in Petone and somewhere else in I Wellington, that he went away leaving bis creditors lamenting, because- he knew he was hopelessly involved. That was a point to which the jury could give very strong weight. : The jury retired to consider its verdict at 11.20 this morning and had not 1 returned when the "Star" went to press. I '