SHOPLIFTING MANIA

Dominion, Volume 25, Issue 169, 13 April 1932, Page 7

SHOPLIFTING MANIA

\ Wealthy Woman in Court NO HOPE OF CURE i A wealthy woman, the wife of a Government official, was before the Marylebone magistrate in London a few weeks ago on a charge of shoplifting. The defendant was stated to have recently come into a fortune of £BOOO on the death of her mother. She pleaded guilty to stealing: Two lace slips, one pair pyjamas, four dress shields, four sleeve shields, oatcake, lib. butter, jar of herring roe, two combs, Ir e packets of biscuits, two packets of nuts, a lemon, veal loaf, meat pie, tin of beans, and four bars of chocolate. The goods were valued at £3/12/9. Counsel said that in 1918 defendant, was bound over far shoplifting and was again bound over in 1921. Dr. Hugh Creighton Miller, mental specialist,- of Harley Street, said that he had treated the defendant since 1918. She was one of those unfortunate people of peculiar mentality who were perfectly irresponsible in the way of acquisitiveness for reasons which the

medical profession understood very well, but, unfortunately, could not control. Had she not been deaf he would have' had the highest hopes of curing her, but her infirmity made her unbeatable by the only method that was likely to be effective. The Magistrate: She is rather a dangerous member of the community? Witness: Very definitely so. The danger that her weakness would manifest itself again will always be present, and no sort of penal treatment will have the slightest benefit. Segregation was called for, he added, and had previously had a beneficial effect. Defending counsel said that defendant’s husband and her family had done everything they could to restrain her. They suggested that she should be segregated in a home and made to deposit in court £lOO, on condition that she stayed there at least a year. The magistrate said he was very sorry for defendant’s relations, but he did not see why he should deal with the case in a different way from any other. He fined the woman £2O, with five guineas costs, or three months’ imprisonment.