DEATH PENALTY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 127, 1 June 1931, Page 9

DEATH PENALTY.

OPPOSITION OPPOSED. PRISON WARDERS TEARFUL. PROTEST TO GOVERNMENT. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY, May 28. Prison warders in New South Wales are apprehensive of the new Law Reform Bill, now before the New South Wales Parliament. The bill provides for the abolition of the death penalty, and warders say that such a measure will endanger them in their occupation. So perturbed have they become that they had made a special appeal to the Minister in charge of the bill to modify the clause dealing with the abolition of the death penalty. The secretary of the Public Service Association, in a letter to the Premier this week, said:—

"In the course of their duties, the staff of the Prisons Department have to deal with the most refractory criminals, and the warders, so to speak, carry their lives in their hands. It is reasonable to assume that the existence of the death penalty is a deterrent upon criminals who otherwise might desire to wreak vengeance upon gaol officials. Previous Assaults. The gaol warders are not concerned with the principle of. whether or not the death penalty should be abolished, but they have recollections of grave assaults having been committed upon warders by life-sentence prisoners. The warders believe that, with the removal of the death penalty, murderers doomed to a lifetime in gaol, and knowing that their own lives could not be made forfeit, would become more daring and violent in their onslaughts on those in authority over them. i From one quarter it has been suggested that the only other deterrent which would influence the violent criminal would be the use of the lash.