PRISONERS SENTENCED

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 144, 19 June 1915, Page 6

PRISONERS SENTENCED

♦■ ONE WANTS TO GO TO THE WAR Two prisoners were brought before his Honour the Chief Justice (Sir Robert Stout) at the Supreme Court this moming -to be sentenced. L&co Stephen Curtis, formerly clerk of the Ohakune Borough Council, had been remanded previously on Sx charges of theft, his Honour having a-greed to release him if the military authorities would accept him again for service. Curtis had been brought back from Egypt to answer the charges. Sir John Findlay, K.C., who, with u Mr. D. R. Hoggard, appeared for prisoner, stated that he had received a cablegram from Lieut. -Col. Charters, in Egypt : •' Tell Curtis report me- at Alexandria. I will send him to the front." Since receiving that message he had been informed of another matter by the Crown Prosecutor, and wished to have an opportunity of investigating it. Prisoner was accordingly remanded until Monday. THEFT OF A MAIL-BAG-Axel Edward William Lythberg, a young man, had .pleaded guilty to the theft of a mail-bag. Mr. T. M. Wilford produced evidence a3 to prisoner's previous good character, and contended that he had not been in a position of trust. He was a railway clerk, and when on duty at Halcombe Station saw the postal clerks take the mail-bag into the van. He stole it from there, and used the money to help furnish his house. He had since been married. Counsel asked for probation. His Honour said this was a case on tho border-line, at all events. If prisoner had been a postal clerk he could not have obtained probation, and it was not very much different his being a railway official. His previous character, however, had been good, and his Honour would admit him to probation for twelve months, though it was a great risk. The money stolen must be repaid within a week, and afterwards costs must be paid to the prosecution.