THEFT OF FISH.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 228, 25 September 1940, Page 11

THEFT OF FISH.

PRISON FOR SEAMAN. INCIDENT ON THE MAORI. WELLINGTON", Tuesday. "I think you two made your case worse by trying to bluff it out aiif l . telling Hes," eaid Mt. J. L. Stout, S.M., when imposing a sentence of one month's imprisonment with hard labour upon Ralph Copley, a seaman, aged 32, and Robert Adams, a seaman, aged 37, who were jointly charged with the theft of some crayfieh and two other fieh, forming part of the deck cargo of the Maori when she was at Lyttelton on September 13. The men denied the charge. Copley was represented by Mr. F. W. Ongley. Detective-Sergeant P. Doyle, who prosecuted, eaid that the two men were part of the crew of the Maori, and both were in the engineroom. The chief officer saw the accused among the deck cargo opening a case of fish. They had a hammer and a bucket, and when the officer approached he found that they had four or five crayfish and some other fish in a bucket. He spoke to them, and Copley eaid it wae "a fair catch"; Adams replied that the bucket had been there before. The officer asked why broach the cargo when they could buy fieh for a few shillings in the town, and Adams said: "If we put it back, will it be »H right?" Mr. Ongley, summarising Copley's case, eaid that the defendant went on deck for a "breather." Immediately he got there, he saw Adams by the rail, *nd the mate came along and said: "What'e going on '"here?" Copley was taken aback. The mate went off into a tirade and said that stuff had been taken for eome time, and he had got , to get eomebody for it. He eaid he. was going to report tfhe matter to the union, and°Copley declined to have anything further to eay. There was neither a hammer nor a bucket there, and the men had not interfered with the cases of fish.