FIVE-MINUTE HUSBANDS.

Auckland Star, Volume LVI, Issue 26, 31 January 1925, Page 11

FIVE-MINUTE HUSBANDS.

AN OFFICIAL MOVE. TO STOP BIGAMY CONSPIRACY. Rigorous measures to check the "conspiracy of bigamy," which has recently assumed alarming proportions in this country, are contemplated by the Home Secretary, says the London "Sunday News." Scores of French girls have been ; brought over to this country by an in- ■ ternational group of conspirators and j married at renter offices to Englishmen whom they had never seen before, : and who receive £.5 apiece for going , through die marriage ceremony with these stranjie women. Already two or three men have lieen I convicted of bigamy in connection with the traflic. and ten days ago a man named King, who was described as one of the principals in the organisation. i was sentenced to three years' penal I servitude- [ The Home Secretary has now come io 'grips with the evil. He has asked the i police lei exert themselves to the utmost in making further arrests and so preventing the traffic from spreading. Xew Scotland Yard detectives engaged I specially in the 'White Slave Traiiie i Suppression Department are actively I pursuing inquiries in various direction's, and it is fully expected that before long all the leaders of the gang will be placed ;in the dock. I Inquiries made by our special representative reveal an amazing state of affairs, not only in the comparative ; ease with which undesirable aliens of the worst character gain admission into rh'fr- country, but in the laxity of our ■ marriHge laws, which will certainly have tn be amended berfore the evils can be stamped out. Husband for £5. It is a startling fact that Englishmen can be bought for £.1 to fill for five I minutes the role of husband to young ' French girls whom they have never seen , before and whose names thry do not even know. These girls, having started on a disreputable career in Paris, come I over here at the instigation of the White \ Slave organisation. i The} , obtain their passports from the French Government in the ordinary way, and when 'hey land the alien? officers have no option but to admit them They give as their reason for visiting England either that they are on holiday or on business, and on their arrival in London they are met and housed liy the leaders of the organisation. Married to Englishmen they become Krili.-li subjects, immune from deportation, no matter what offence they may commit. ; A couple, absolute strangers to each i other, can walk into a register ntlice and get married, no matter whether the names and addresses they have ;rnen : arc false or not. . . All they have t" do ;is to day—not to prove-that one of them ■has resided in the district of tho register office for lli day,, and they can then become man and wifeThose are the linos on which these French girls, most of whom do not know rd ■■< KngHxh. become British sulljc( . ts . 'Under the wing of the Whiu. Slavers, the "wife is taken to a Westend flat, which they have furnished for hnr, and there she carries on her degrading occupation. Should nn« of these frirls fall into-the hands of the police, she is able to produce her marriajrc certificate showing that she is a British subject, and the j authorities are powerless to deport her.