CHARGES OF "CONSORTING."

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 224, 21 September 1928, Page 5

CHARGES OF "CONSORTING."

POLICE METHODS CRITICISED.

THREE MEN GIVEN A CHANCE,

(By Telegraph—Own Correspondent.) NEW PLYMOUTH, Thursday.

Strong objection to the methods ot the police in prosecuting men under the Vagrancy Act was expressed by a solicitor to-day when delending three men who were chargcd with being "idle and disorderly persons," in that they habitually consorted with reputed thieves. The men were William Sydney Stroud, Leonard Edward Smith and James Patrick Osgood Carroll. The police gave evidence that they had seen Smith and Stroud in the company of convicted thieves on several occasions. They had been frequenting a billiard saloon owned by a man who had since left New Plymouth and had been convicted at Auckland on a charge of false pretences. Both Smith and Stroud had served two years' reformative detention. Carroll's last offence, involving dishonesty, had been committed in 1925, when he served three months' imprisonment. Mr. A. A. Bennett, for the defence, protested that to charge any man with "consorting" when he had visited a billiard saloon whose proprietor had since been convicted, was straining the law. The men were out of work, and were discharged convicts, but were not reputed thieves. The object of prison detention -was to encourage reformation, but it was clear from the charge that j the three accused were being discouraged from reformation. Counsel called evidence to show that all three had tried to get -work. Mr. Tate, S.M., said the only thing to save the accused from prison was for them to separate, and get work at. such distance apart that their association would cease. He did not want to send them to gaol if he could help it, but to give them a chance to become decent citizens. They must obtain work at different places as far from New Plvmouth as possible. The cases were adjourned until October