Man Sent To Gaol For Four Years For Arson

Press, Volume C, Issue 29536, 10 June 1961, Page 16

Man Sent To Gaol For Four Years For Arson

Gavin Edgar William Kinsman, aged 32, a workman, was sentenced to four years' imprisonment by Mr Justice Macarthur in the Supreme Court yesterday when he appeared for sentence on a charge of arson. Kinsman was also sentenced to one year's gaol on a charge of attempted false pretences, and one yearts gaol on a charge of making a false declaration, these sentences to be served concurrently -with the term imposed in the arson charge. Kinsman had been found guilty by a jury of wilfully setting fire to a restaurant known as the Purple Cow in Stanmore road. He did not propose, said his Honour, to impose a sentence of preventive detention (from three to 14 years’ gaol) on the prisoner. It appeared from the prisoner's record that he was not a dangerously-minded criminal but rather a person of mental instability. The prisoner had attempted to obtain a substantial sum by false pretences and had made a false declaration. These were serious offences, but he would regard them as stemming from the main offence of arson. The sentence for arson could be life imprisonment, said his Honour, and he must impose a substantial term for such a serious offence. For Kinsman, Mr S. H. Wood said that the prisoner was eligible for preventive detention under the “nuisance” section of the Criminal Justice Act. He had a large number of previous convictions for small offences, rather than serious offences. The charge of arson was a most serious one, but it should be pointed out that the prisoner had not been benefited by one penny. "The prisoner has not the mental ability to commit a serious crime successfully. It was a clumsy, stupid attempt with no hope of success which was laid bare in the

first routine step of insurance investigations,” Mr Wood said. Kinsman was a most immature person. He left school when he was 14, and was then only in standard three. There were obvious signs of mental instability in his history outlined in the probation officer’s report. “I suggest that he is before this Court because of a sudden feeling of hopelessness because he had taken on this business of running a restaurant and realised it was far too big a venture for his limited intelligence,” Mr ’Tood said. He submitted that Kinsman showed signs of settling down and realising that he was far better working for wages. A finite term of imprisonment, therefore, at the prisoner s age. would be more suitable than the sentence of preventive detention. To his Honour. Mr Wood said that a Crown witness had estimated it would take £1652 to restore the building after the fire. Mr C. M. Roper made no submissions for the Crown.