Magistrate’s Court Further remand on sword-attack count

Press, 30 August 1977, Page 10

Magistrate’s Court Further remand on sword-attack count

A woman charged with as-,( saulting a Christchurch j policeman with a shark-] tooth sword earlier this month was remanded to September 12 for the taking ( of depositions when she ap- ; peared in the Magistrate’s 1 Court yesterday. j Appearing before Mr F. G. 1 Paterson, S.M., was Alecia f Francis Savage, aged 26. The Court was told that the tak- ' ing of depositions, originally set down for yesterday, 1 could not proceed because ' counsel was not available. Savage was also remanded ’ without plea to September ( 12 on a charge of receiving. - The assault charge relates ] to an incident in an Aranui * house on August 9, when ' the defendant allegedly tried to drive two policemen out 1 of the house with the metre- ] long ceremonial sword as they tried to arrest two] prison escapers. BURGLARY CHARGES Kenneth Arthur Foskett, i ( aged 29, who stole property valued at S2OOO from a,. Lower Hutt house and later; sold it for $2OO, was convicted and remanded in custody to September 5. The defendant appeared on six charges. He pleaded , guilty to four, with the remaining two, to be defended.i being remanded to Auckland. Sergeant J. C. Rowe said the Tai Tapu Hotel was bur-] gled in February and liquor i valued at 5539 taken. A police patrol stopped Foskett and his associates in their; vehicle soon after. The defendant denied committing the offence and said the liquor had been picked up for a party. Foskett also pleaded guilty to unlawfully taking a car, to removing a portable radio and a colour television set valued at $2051, and to a] breach of probation. Foskett denied a charge of taking bedding valued at $lB6 from an Auckland; motel and to obtaining' credit by fraud at the same motel.

(Before Mr J. S. Bisphan, t S.M.) < CHINESE WEAPON < A youth who carried num- i chuckers — a Chinese mar- | tiai-arts weapon — with him , in Cathedral Square was convicted of carrying an of- ] fensive weapon in a public place. The numchuckers, made , from two wooden batons,' about 30cm long and linked, with a 25cm-long chain,] were presented in court. The Court was told that at < 4.30 a.m. on August 14, i noiicemen patrolling the I Square asked to search a 1 bag Craig Ronald Campbell, i aged 16, had with him in a taxi. 'i They found the numchuckers in the bag. When asked why he carried them,, Campbell had said that he] carried them for protection because he was sick and tired of being beaten up. The defendant said in evidence that he had made the numchuckers himself be-1 cause an original set cost I $250. He had gone to hospi-] tai to show them to a friend. He had then gone to a nightclub, handing the bag containing the weapon to an attendant. He was about to| take a taxi home when the police had found the numchuckers. After five years of train-! I ing in jujitsu and karate, he would not need to use the weapon to defend himself.. He had a green belt in ka- 1 irate and part of that train-, ing involved talking people! out of fighting. The Magistrate convicted Campbell, gave him a sus-i pended sentence, and ordered him to pay $3O to-1 wards the cost of the prosecution. He ordered that the, numchuckers be confiscated. I Robert Paul Jennings, who faces 16 charges of burglary and was to have been sentenced yesterday, was further I remanded to Friday for sen- ■ . tence. The Court was told that

this was because the defendant would appear in the Supreme Court tomorrow, when a plea of insanity would be made on a charge of his having caused grievous bodily harm to a Beckenham shopkeeper on July 5. Jennings entered no plea on a charge of escaping from Sunnyside Hospital on August 16. PAINT THEFT A man who stole 17 cans of paint valued at $97 from a New Brighton firm because, as a self-employed painter, he had been unable to obtain credit to buy paint was conivicted and sentenced to four months periodic detention and put on probation for 12 months. The Magistrate told Robert 'John Keenan, aged 21, that I although the offence was serious, he was prepared to give him another chance. The defendant was appre-i hended by a police patrol I I while carying the cans of' paint from the New Brighton (firm to his car about 2 a.m. on August 20. Before Mr B. A. Palmer, S.M. BURGLARY SPREE A youth who went on a burglary spree was told by; the Magistrate that he would ] ibe serving a long term of ] , imprisonment if he were noti so young. Samuel Kotara, aged 16, | had earlier been convicted on | ,11 charges of breaking and entering, one of theft, two of i , unlawfully taking a car, and ione of unlawfully getting into a car. The offences, committed with four older co-offenders between May 13 and July 17, ] included the taking of goods , valued at $3567. The community-service sentence recommended by the probation officer was “singularly inappropriate”, said the Magistrate, and detention- [ centre training was too short. |He sentenced Kotara to bor- : 1 stal training.