REHEARING GRANTED

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 124, 19 February 1938, Page 7

REHEARING GRANTED

Two Car Conversion Charges . UNUSUAL TWIST TO CASE By way of rehearing, two charges of motor-car conversion were preferred in the Magistrates’ Court, Wellington, yesterday, before Mr. W. F. Stilwell, S.M., against Thomas Henry Hale, labourer, aged 25. Haler was charged with converting a motor-car valued at £225, the property of T. M. Woods, Wellington, on July 23, 1037, and on July 9, 1937, converting a car valued at £45, the property of M. H. Sunderland, Wellington. ' Accused elected to be dealt with summarily and pleaded not guilty to.the-.fi'rst. charge and guilty to the second. Detective-Sergeant P. Doyle said the police intended to offer no evidence on the first charge. As regards the second, on Jtily 9, Mr. Sunderland' parked his ear in Wellington at 9.15 p.in:. and when he-returned at 10.30 p.m. he found it gone. At 5,30 a.in. the following day a taxi-driver travelling Horn Wellington to Palmerston North, gave two men a lift to Palmerston North. They said their car had broken down near the Whirokino Bridge and asked if he had noticed it. The taxi-driver had seen the car and memorised the number, and, subsequently hearing that a car had been stolen, he reported the matter to the police. The car was recovered in a damaged condition. Hale was at present serving a sentence of two years’ reformative detention on the charge of converting Mr. Woods's car. The police were not proceeding with that charge lor the following reason : Two young men had been arrested for unlaw-, fid conversion of motor-cars and one of them in a statement had admitted, truthfully or otherwise, converting Mr. Woods’s car. The matter had been brought under the notice of the Department of Justice and, in view of the doubt, Hale had been advised to apply for a rehearing. On the other charge. Hale had appeared before" the court on. August 12 and pleaded guilty. He was convicted and ordered to come up for sentence-with-in two years if called on. Accused was a very old offender and .it was his twentyseventh appearance before the court. He had already served sixi months of the two years. Mr. J. Meltzer, who appeared for Hale, said that, despite his formidable list, he hail served six months for an offence which, in effect, he had not committed. For that reason counsel suggested that on the other charge accused might be convicted and come up for sentence if called on. The action of the police had been quite proper, said the magistrate. As accused had served approximately six months oil a charge which had now been dismissed, for want of prosecution, he would be convicted and ordered to come up for sentence if culled on within 12 months on the second charge. Hale was ordered to pay witnesses' expenses, £2/2/7, as directed by the probation officer.