PRISONER ESCAPES FROM MOUNT COOK GAOL

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3031, 19 March 1917, Page 4

PRISONER ESCAPES FROM MOUNT COOK GAOL

STILL AT LARGE. A prisoner CBcaped from th 6 Mount Cook prison on Saturday morning, and. he is still at large. The man's nam© is John Dome. He is serving a sentence of five years' imprisonment for indecent assault, a crime of which ho was convicted in the ■Wellington Supreme Court. Dome has before proved himEclf rather a elusive person, for he was not apprehended on the charge on which he now stands convicted until three years after the offence was committed.

Tho escape occurred about eight o'clock on Saturday morning. The prisoners at Mount Cook are engaged in brick-making, and Dome was instructed by a warder to water some clay in the brickyard. The warder meanwhile gave his attention to another prisoner, and Dome, finding himself unobserved for the moment, seized the opportunity to make a dash for liberty. Nobody saw him leave, but. ho must have scaled the wall. Tho hue and cry was not raised until information caine from an outside source that a man in prison garb had been seen making his way towards Brooklyn. Tho prison staff set out in pursuit, but they lost trace of their quarry in the roughish country between Brooklyn and Island Bay. By this the police were moving, and thereafter tho hunt was left to them. It is reported that the fugitive acquired a suit of clothes early in his flight.

These escapes from_ prisons occur now and then in all prison systems. A. warder gives most of his attention In the worst men under his care, and takes an occasional risk with a m3ii who has heeu docile for some time. It is a fact in prison experience that prisoners guilty of the class of offence for which llorne is serving a sentence are usually regarded as the easiest of all prisoners to control.