Perjury admitted

Press, 24 October 1980, Page 5

Perjury admitted

A youth, who admitted in the District Court yesterday having committed perjury in a hearing of a theft charge against a friend of his last January, allegedly said in a statement to police that he remembered taking the oath to tell the truth but “did not realise how serious the path was until now.” The defendant, Normar Richard James Hindson, aged 19, a machine operator, pleaded guilty after a hearing of depositions of evidence, or statements, from seven prosecution witnesses to the offence. Mr C. A. Pilgrim and Mrs J. Taylor, Justices of the Peace, remanded the defendant in custody to the High Court for sentence on a date to be fixed. Counsel (Mr M. J. Knowles) reserved his submissions. The defendant had originally elected trial by jury on the charge of committing purjury as a witness in a District Court hearing on January 28 of a charge of theft against Stanley William Thomas Maffey. The charge listed the circumstances of the offence as his having falsely stated in

i evidence on oath that the ■ car in which Maffey, the i defendant, and another per- ; son were travelling on the ; night of August 27-28, last , year, had not stopped on the : Port Hills. Prosecution evidence had been that the vehicle had stopped, and a cassetteradio, chequp book, and driver’s licence were taken ■ from a parked car, which was unlawfully entered. ’ A police patrol stopped their car at 3.50 a.m. on 1 August 28 and found the items inside. Detective G. D. Hathaway , said that when he ques- ’ tioned the defendant in February 'in regard to the per- , jury inquiry,, the defendant freely admitted having lied on oath in the Court case, in saying that the car he and Maffey and another person . were driving in, had not stopped on the Port Hills. He allegedly said in a statement to the detective that lie did not realise the '■ seriousness of taking the oath, and that he had told deliberate lies, “based on what Stanley told me to ; say,”. that the car never l stopped. , ■■