COMMUNIST GAOLED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 243, 15 October 1931, Page 10

COMMUNIST GAOLED.

ENCOURAGING LAWLESSNESS. MAGISTRATE'S COMMENTS. "GOING TO KEEP THE PEACE." James Henry Edwards, a Communist, was convicted yesterday afternoon and sentenced to one month's imprisonment on a charge of encouraging lawlessness. In sentencing him, Mr. F. K. Hunt, S.M., remarked: "It is my duty to keep the peace, and I'm going to do it."

Cross-examined by Chief Detective Hammond, Edwards said Detective Nalder, the principal witness for the prosecution, was a pretty fair man. "But there is room for improvement," Edwards added. "He colours his statements. He has misquoted me." Mr. Hammond: Men expelled from the doss-house went to the house in Norfolk Street ? —Yes. Many of them are Communists? —I don't really know. Who authorised the bringing of the batons to the house? —I don't know. I didn't. They may have been pieces of firewood. Are you not in the habit' of inciting lawlessness by your words and actions? —No. "This is a very unpleasant duty for me," said Mr. Hunt, at the end of the case. "One of my first duties is to preserve the peace in the city. The question is whether Edwards did use the words complained of in the charge. I have no doubt that he did use them. I think, however, that Edwards was carried away by his own feelings and his exuberance, and that lie would say what he would not write. Edwards says now that lie wanted thousands to go" to the scene of the eviction for the purpose of having a moral effect. As it happened there was no.trouble at the eviction. But there might have been ferious trouble, a riot, and someone mifllit have been killed or injured, had

not a large body of police gone to the house. Edwards has not been to prison before —" " , Chief Detective Hammond: Yes, sir, in 1917, for breJcli of a by-la,w. "Oh, that's nothing," replied the magistrate. "Anyway it- was a long time ago. I will forget about that." Mr. Hammond: And he has been bound over to keep the peace. Mr. Schramm: That was for a trivial, technical offence. Mr. Hunt: It must have been, as' the bond was only one of £10. On this charge he will bo sentence,d to one month's imprisonment.