PRISONER ACQUITTED

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31381, 29 May 1967, Page 14

PRISONER ACQUITTED

“The Special Service \ HAMILTON, May 28. A jury found Mervyn Anthony Rich, aged 23, not guilty of assaulting Mr Stewart Hardy, SAI., at the Waikeria Youth Centre.

The trial was held in the Supreme Court at Hamilton before Mr Justice Speight Rich, who is serving a sentence in the Auckland prison, was represented by Mr K. Bennetts.

Mr K. L. Sandford appeared for the Crown. Maxwell Herbert Hindmarsh, prison officer, said he was present when the hearing of an alleged breach of regulations by Rich was conducted before Mr Hardy at Waikeria.

William Elliott first officer in the close security block at Waikeria, said that during the hearing Mr Hardy gave Rich an opportunity to question witnesses and asked him if he had anything to say on his own behalf.

Mr Hardy had asked Rich about his health, and Rich had replied that he was not too well. Mr Hardy then referred to medical reports and told Rich these indicated that he had been restored to health.

Witness said Rich replied: 'Then why ask me if you already know?” Mr Hardy told Rich he was interested in him and Rich replied: “You don’t care about me.” When Mr Hardy said he

found Rich guilty Rich grabbed the table and threw it into Mr Hardy’s lap. The front edge of the table struck his legs. Rich said in evidence that he did not intend to attack Mr Hardy with the table, but when he heard that he was to be sentenced he felt this was unjust and he became agitated. He had put his hands on the table as a gesture “to sort of implore” Mr Hardy not to sentence him.

If the prison officers had not immediately laid hands on him the table would not have been lifted into Mr Hardy’s lap. “I was not the cause of the table being up-ended,” he said.

His Honour told the jury that in reaching their verdict the fact that one man in the case was a magistrate and another a prison inmate should be treated as irrelevant in arriving at a decision. It had been a slight incident, said his Honour. It was over in a flash and accused could not have done much harm as he was surrounded by warders. It was necessary, however, that discipline should be enforced both in the community at large and in prisons. Mr Hardy was not called as a witness and did not appear in Court.

After the jury brought in its verdict, his Honour discharged Rich on this count Rich also appeared before the Court for sentence on a separate charge of assaulting a prison officer. His Honour said: “Rich, I have some sympathy for you. You are your own worst enemy as you get upset so easily.” But every other prisoner would pay regard, his Honour added, to how Rich was dealt with for assaulting a prison officer.

He was sentenced to three months' imprisonment, cumulative with the term he was already serving.