APPEAL DISMISSED

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26121, 25 May 1950, Page 3

APPEAL DISMISSED

CONVICTION AT BLENHEIM UPHELD (New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, May 24. The Court of Appeal, consisting of the Chief Justice (Sir Humphrey O’Leary). Mr Justice Gresson and Mr Justice Hutchison, gave judgment today in an appeal by Robert Bernard Howe, of Christchurch, and Roderick Archibald Mcßae, of Christchurch, against their conviction and sentence by Mr Justice Northcroft at Blenheim on July 6. 1949. A jury found both Howe and Mcßae guilty of robbery and violence, and the trial Judge sentenced each to three years’ imprisonment with hard labour. Mcßae was also found guilty of attempted car conversion, for which he was sentenced to one year’s imprisonment with hard labour, to bo served concurrently, and he was further sentenced to six months imprisonment for theft of clothing. The grounds for the appeal were that the trial Judge had misdirected the jury and that the Judge had failed, in summing up, to direct the jury that it could give separate and different verdicts in respect of each of the accused. The Appeal Court’s judgment said that it was not convinced that there had been a substantial miscarriage of justice. The appeal was dismissed.