Menopausal disorder ‘a crucial element’ in fraud

Press, 22 June 1984, Page 14

Menopausal disorder ‘a crucial element’ in fraud

PA Hamilton A Hamilton housewife convicted of forging cheques for $45,000 had a disease of the mind arising from menopause, the District Court at Hamilton was told. The woman, whose name is suppressed in the interim, appeared before Judge Latham and a jury charged with forgery and uttering and attempting to use a document for pecuniary advantage. She was found guilty and remanded until July 17 for a probation report and sentence.

The prosecutor, Mr David Wilson, said that before the offences the woman’s husband was involved in an unsuccessful business venture with the complainant.

After the partnership was dissolved she opened a Post Office Savings Bank account in the name of the complainant’s wife. She deposited two of the complainant’s cheques, signed in his name, for $20,000 and $25,000. About a month later she went to the Auckland Central Post Office and tried to withdraw $12,000. Defence counsel Mr A. Hassall, said the woman had no recollection of committing any of the offences. "She is a good living, high-principled woman of impeccable behaviour,” Mr Hassall said. Her husband said he was “comfortably off” and his wife had $29,000 in her own bank account, a new car,

several investments, and a home unit. The husband said his wife had an obsession about his former partner. A Rotorua psychiatrist, Dr Henry Bennett, said he believed the woman was suffering a disease of the mind to such an extent that she was incapable of knowing she was doing wrong. “It is a well-known medical fact that women going through menopause suffer various types of emotional disorders,” Dr Bennett said. She was suffering an obsessional neurosis, and was legally, but not medically, insane.

“I believe the menopausal period was a crucial element in this,” he said.