"TWENTY-FIVE LASHES."

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 181, 2 August 1929, Page 5

"TWENTY-FIVE LASHES."

YOUNG MAN'S REQUEST.

PBOFUSE TEABS IN COURT.

MAGISTRATE SAYS. "ONE MONTH." (By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent.) HAMILTON, this day. "If you would place me on probation, say, for three years., and order me 25 lashes, I think it would do me more good than sending me to prison, your Honor.'' Ihis extraordinary request came from a. diminutive voting man. of the stature of a jockey, named Leslie Alfred John Walters, who pleaded guilty before Mr. Wyvern Wilson, S.M.. to-day, to obtaining credit for £1 10/ by fraud at Wellington. Walters, who is 25 years of age, recently went to a boardinghouse in Wellington. and, telling the proprietor. Thomas Hayman. that Mr. Wilson, a horse trainer, of Takapuna. would pay his board, obtained food and lodging to the value stated. Detective-Sergeant Thompson said accused had admitted the offence. He was a young man who had for a long time done no legitimate work. His appearance suggested he was a jockey, and he made a practice of hanging about racecourses, tipping and "guessing." The detective mentioned that accused, had three previous convictions, for theft at Te Kuiti, for obtaining credit by fraud at Onehunga, and for a breach of probation. Accused, who cried profusely before entering the dock, admitted that what the detective had said was correct. He declared he was not exactly a criminal. He had lost his parents nine years ago, and. having no brothers or sisters, he had been left largely to his own devices. He had held some good jobs as a private chauffeur, but when he had fallen out of work he had had 110 home to go to, so he had drifted. He felt quite sure that if his Worship placed him on probation, say, for three years, and ordered him 25 lashes it would do him more good, and he would come through and be the better for it, than if he was sent to gaol. His Worship told accused not to talk nonsense. He (his Worship) could not order him 25 lashes, and if he could he would not do so. He could not treat accused as a poor, homeless child. He was a man of 25, and the present was not the first time he had imposed on people.

He was sentenced to one month's imprisonment.