CHARGE AGAINST POSTWOMAN

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27221, 12 December 1953, Page 8

CHARGE AGAINST POSTWOMAN

LETTERS DESTROYED WHEN DRUNK ACCUSED REMANDED FOR SENTENCE (New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, December 11. A postwoman who became drunk and failed to deliver nearly 600 letters, newspapers, and circulars, pleaded guilty in the Magistrate’s Court at Wellington today to destroying four letters. Sub-Inspector C. L. Spencer, who prosecuted, said that after collecting her mail from the Post Office on Saturday, October 24, Nora Louise Joan Goodwin Guise, married, aged 35, went to a friend’s house, drank some liquor, and later went home intoxicated. When the Post and Telegraph Department received complaints from people expecting letters in Guise’s area, the accused suggested the letters had been stolen, when she left her mailbag unattended. When the police searched Guise’s house, they found 189 letters, 34 newspapers, and 350 circulars which should have been delivered. They also learned that 20 letters had been burned —unrecognisable portions were still hr the fireplace. Guise explained to the police that she had burned the letters because she was frightened. Three of the letters burned were Government superannuation vouchers.

The Magistrate (Mr W. H. Carson. S.M.) refused an application for the suppression of the accused’s name, and remanded her for sentence on Monday, pending a report by the probation officer.