Court convicts salvor

Press, 16 July 1983, Page 8

Court convicts salvor

PA Tauranga A former marine salvor was convicted yesterday of the first charge laid under the Historic Places Act. Kenneth Walter Durey, aged 35, now of Auckland, had pleaded not guilty to a charge that last year, about Bkm north-east of Waihi beach, he wilfully modified an archaeological site, the wreck of the S.S. Taupo. Durey was found guilty by Judge Wilson in the

District Court at Tauranga, at the end of a three-day defended hearing during which 18 prosectuion witnesses and two defence witnesses were called. The Judge convicted Durey and ordered him to pay $2500 witnesses’ expenses, $2O costs, and $l2OO solicitors’ fees.

He said he would take into account that it was a test case, that Durey was sympathetic.to the need to preserve sites such as the

Taupo, and that damage to the Taupo stopped. A minimal amount of materia! was taken and the wreck had only just come into the “100-year-old” requirement of the act. Durey had denied salvaging any material from the Taupo, a hulk, which sank while being towed to Auckland on April 29, 1881. The Judge said though the evidence was circumstantial, he believed Durey had “modified” the wreck.