EIGHT CHARGES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 146, 21 June 1940, Page 3

EIGHT CHARGES.

EX-COMMUNIST SECRETARY. FARMER BEFORE COURT. (By Telegraph.—Press Association.) PALMERSTON N., Thursday. The hearing was continued in the Police Court to-day, before Mr. H. P. Lawry, S.M., of eight charges under the public safety and censorship regulations against Leo Sim, a farmer, of Hiraatangi. It was alleged that he was responsible for the publication of subversive statements in a pamphlet entitled "The Spark," described as the official organ of the New Zealand Bolshevik party. The accused, who conducted his own defence, after calling' two witnesses, addressed the Court. He detailed his service in the Great War and in the Public Service. He was a member of the Communist party from 1921 until just before last Christmas, when he resigned because of the party's political attitude toward the war. In 1931 he was fined £100 on a charge of distributing seditious literature, but served three months' imprisonment as an alternative. "I do not wish to hide the fact that I am prepared to accept and abide by the decisions of the Communist International," he said. "I was a delegate to the seventh world congress of the Communist International, held in Moscow in 1935. After my return I was elected general secretary of the Communist party in New Zealand, which position I vacated in 1937." The magistrate reserved his decision. The hearing of five charges under the public safety regulations against Harold William Klein, aged 30, a law clerk, was also concluded. Evidence was given that the accused had purchased duplication stencils, and also that his handwriting was on envelopes which contained copies of "The Spark," the organ of the New Zealand Bolshevik party. Klein did not call evidence. The magistrate reserved his decision.