SUPREME COURT ACQUITTAL

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25243, 23 July 1947, Page 9

SUPREME COURT ACQUITTAL

—•— ACCUSED ARRESTED AGAIN

DIFFERENT CHARGE LAID (P.A.) WELLINGTON. July 22. Arrested in the Supreme Court yesterday just after a jury had found him not guilty on a charge of theft concerning money for American cigarettes. James Newton Keenan, aged 37, a seaman, was charged in the Magistrate’s Court today with the theft at Auckland on May 28 of a suitcase and contents, valued at £53 ss, the property of C. F. N. Molesworth. On the application of the police he was remanded to appear at Auckland. ’ Asserting that he was the victim of persecution, Keenan conducted his own defence in the Supreme Court case. A taxi driver, Francis John Brown, in evidence, said Kenan hired his cab on June 19. There were three other persons in the cab, including a man referred to throughout as McGillivray. Brown said Keenan asked him if he were interested in American cigarettes. Brown said &L-2K? 8 - and B ave McGillivray £24. McGillivray went into a building and that was the last witness saw of him. Keenan and Brown entered the building to look for McGillivray, but the searcn was unsuccessful. Keenan, in evidence, on his own behalf, said that when McGillivray went into a building with Brown’s £24, he also had £2 10s of Keenan’s own money to buy cigarettes. "I myself lost money to McGillivray.” said Keenan. "I have been five weeks on remand over this carrying on. I have lost my job and lost the money I had on the ship— £3O to £4o—through the persecution of the police. ’’You are a man of parts,’’ said Mr Justice Cornish to Keenan after the jury had announced its verdict. "If you get stuck into good, useful work for a year or two people will stop suspecting von. It is no use being suspected all the time.”