ARMED WITH AXE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 13, 16 January 1940, Page 5

ARMED WITH AXE.

VIOLENT MAORI.

STRUGGLE WITH CONSTABLE.

STORY TOLD IN COURT.

(By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent.) GISBORNE, this day.

The story of a struggle with a young Maori brandishing an axe and threatening the lives of a young woman and a constable at Tokoniaru Bay was related in the Police Court when Hori Waiohenga Hiroki (21), freezing works employee, was sentenced to six months' gaol. On a charge of common assault accused was convicted and sentenced to one month's imprisonment; for assaulting the police he was convicted and sentenced to two months' imprisonment; for using obscene language he was sentenced to two months' gaol; and for resisting arrest he was given one month, the sentences to be cumulative. Hiroki pleaded guilty to all the charges except the one concerning resisting arrest.

Constable Beasley said that he arrived at Wanna at 7.15 p.m. and heard a woman screaming and calling out from the back of a Maori meeting house. Witness saw a woman struggling on the ground with a Maori. He was threatening her and was just going to pick up an axe. Witness grappled with the man and the woman was given the opportunity to escape. After a talk accused calmed down, but he became violent again and in a flash snatched up an axe, swinging it over his head and threatening their lives.

Witness talked to accused and after calming him again had to have the assistance of two Maoris while he handcuffed him. The constable said that if he had not arrived on the scene when he did he was sure that a far more serious crime would have been committed. For the past seven months accused and the woman had been living together as man | and wife. On December 4 Hiroki was I before the Court on a charge of assault [and was convicted and fined £3.