THREE APPEALS DISMISSED

Press, Volume C, Issue 29523, 26 May 1961, Page 16

THREE APPEALS DISMISSED

Assault, Conversion Sentences

It was apparent from his record that Christopher Herbert Johnson, aged 41, a freezing worker, had indulged for a long time in violence, said Mr Justice Macarthur in the Supreme Court yesterday when he rejected an appeal by Johnson against sentence on a charge of assault. Johnson was sentenced in the Magistrate’s Court at Milton on April 21 to a year’s imprisonment on a charge of assaulting his wife. In upholding this sentence his Honour said Johnson was now eligible for preventive detention. Johnson, he said, had committed a brutal assault on his wife, as a result of which she spent 10 days in hospital. The prisoner's record of offences involving violence was thoroughly bad. his Honour said. There were numerous convictions for fighting, assault, and disorderly conduct over many years. The Magistrate evidently considered the time had come when Johnson would have to receive a severe penalty to deter him, and he agreed entirely with the sentence.

Mr D. J. Hewitt appeared for Johnson and Mr P. T. Mahon, for the Crown. His Honour dismissed an appeal by an art student at Canterbury University against a fine of £lO imposed in the Magistrate’s Court on May 8 on a charge of converting a motor-cycle from a house in Oxford terrace on the evening of April 30.

The student, Gavin Mclnnes Patterson, aged 20. was ordered to pay costs of £5 ss.

He had pleaded guilty in •he Magistrate's Court to converting the motor-cycie jointly with Ronald Reginald McKay, aged 23. His Honour said he could not find that the Magistrate had been wrong in taking the view that in effect both men took the machine and that the appellant knew it was being converted. The fine of £lO could not be regarded as excessive, he said.

Mr P. G. S. Penlington appeared for the appellant, and Mr Mahon for the Crown. Borstal Training

An appeal by a Greymouth youth. Kevin John Higgins, aged 17. against a sentence of Borstal training imposed on May 2 on charges of assaulting his father at his home on April 28. and using obscene language within hearing of a public place, was dismissed.

Higgins was not represented by counsel, and did not appear. In his notice of appeal Higgins said the sentence was severe for a family argument. He had not been in trouble for a year, and his family was willing to have him back.

In upholding the Magistrate’s sentence his Honour said it was apparent the Magistrate gained the picture of Higgins as a youth completely undisciplined, and resentful of any authority, whether exercised by his parents or by public officers. Reports showed that he associated with youths who frequen’ed milk bars and drove round in old vehicles.

“I think the Magistrate was clearly justified in regarding this case as the very sort for which Borstal training is designed,” his Honour said.