CRIMINAL LIST.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 248, 19 October 1937, Page 8

CRIMINAL LIST.

NUMBER FOR TRIAL.

LESS THAN AVERAGE.

ADDRESS TO GRAND JURY. OPENING OF SESSIONS. ' I am pleased to be able to way that the numlKT of bills which you will be required to consider is less th<in the average," eaid Mr. Justice Fair in hie uldress to the jrrand jury in the Supreme Court this morning, when ippning the criminal sessions. •'ln this district it is not unusual to .nd some 20 or 30 persons committed or trial at the criminal sessions, but t this session there are only 11 per- ■:..■; committed." .

Mr. Justice Fair.

His Honor said that unfortiuiately four persons were charged with negligent driving so as to cause death. He thought the grand jury would aprree that tho circumetancee should be most carefully inquired into. The police had collected evidence respecting each charge, and thw would lie placed Ik , fore tho grand jury for their consideration. In not one of the- ch«rge« was it shown that the drivers had d played a reekloss disregard of a driver's duty for the safety of those wlro ji*c the roads. The worst type of offonco wa* where a driver knowingly did something with a disregard for the safety of other*. There w;is no fsnch ea»se in the present group of charges. His Honor tlien briefly reviewed tho evidence which would he given for the Crown. Charges of Uttering. "You may have little difficulty in concluding that the evidence calls for an answer by the accused,' , said his Honor in referring to the case in which a man had been committed for trial on four charges of uttering forged £5 notes, and also with obtaining goods by false pretences. His Honor said the evidence was that the notes were forgeries and that they had been passed by the accused on December 24. The notes were such that any business man having the time to look at them would not have accepted them. Tho Crown's evidence wouid be that the accused knew the notes were forgeries. In the charge preferred against a man of stealing .a diamond ring valued at £105, his Honor said he thought the jury nright conclude the charge called for an answer by the accused, who had represented himself as a jockey, and who had won £300. Subsequently he had sold the ring for £35. In the caee of a Maori charged with breaking and entering a warehouse and heft, his Honor directed the grand jury to return a no bill on the charge of breaking and entering, saying that by no stretch of the word could warehouse mean part of a racing club's pavilion. Members of Grand Jury. The following were the grand jury: Messrs. Vernon Thompson Drew (foreman), Stephen Henry Airey, William Reginald Bayne, Eric Monekton Bennett, Alfred Raymond Bering, Harold Leslie Bowden, Walter Clayton Browne, Christopher Clarkeon, John Donald, Norman Alexander Duthie, Henry Francis Finlay, Erneet Harper, John Jerratt, Hugh Lawry, Leonard Michael Lennan, William Henry McCallum, Alfred Pascoe, Leslie William Rainger, Thomas Edward Reynolds, William Hamilton Shearer, Reginald George Tappenden, Henry Herbert -Watkins.