FAILURE TO ACCOUNT

Dominion, Volume 25, Issue 99, 21 January 1932, Page 10

FAILURE TO ACCOUNT

Subscription Money Spent

POLICE CASES YESTERDAY A powerfully-built man, Joseph McGovern, a carpenter, aged 59, was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment by Mr. E. Page, S.M., in the Police Court yesterday, for having obtained £8 from Joseph Albert Cole by false pretences, and failing to account to the New Zealand Workers’ Union for £4l/5/-. He pleaded guilty to both charges. Detective-Sergeant Revell said that McGovern had been one of a gang of 300 men employed on railway works at Te Kopu, near Gisborne. He was there known as Paddy Sheehan, and had been elected as secretary to collect subscriptions for the Workers' Union. Cole was a cook at the camp, and when undertaking the job had been asked to deposit a bond of £25 as good faith. He had paid £8 toward the bond to McGovern, who, however, had gone on a drinking bout, and had spent Cole’s £B, as well as £4l/5/- he had collected in subscriptions on behalf of the New Zealand Workers’ Union. Accused was well known to the police, as he had quite a number of convictions against him for false pretences and theft. The Magistrate sentenced McGovern to six months’ imprisonment on each charge, the sentences to be concurrent. Girl Sent to Borstal Rita Piper, a housemaid, aged 19, for habitually consorting with thieves and undesirables, was committed to the Borstal Institution for a period not exceeding three years. Counsel for the girl said that her father had paid her board in the city, and had no idea of the life she had been leading. Two Men Remanded William Johnston, engine-driver, aged 29, and Arthur Albert Clayton, blacksmith, aged 21, who were arrested by Constable Tocker at Johnsonville yesterday morning, appeared later in the day before the Magistrate to answer a charge of having been found without lawful excuse on premises known as the Community Store. On the application of Detective-Ser-geant Revell, who said that other charges were being inquired, into, a remand 4?r a week was granted.