THE PENALTIES

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 32, 6 August 1921, Page 6

THE PENALTIES

PRISONERS SENTENCED

Five prisoners who had pleaded guilty I to offences in the Lower Court were taken before his Honour Mr. Justice Reed at the Supreme Court for sentenc* this morning. THEFT OP GEMS. The first prisoner dealt with was Herbert Julius Mailer, who had admitted the theft of gems valued at over £200 from his employer, Charles Bertram Kline, during, the period from early in t December last to the beginning of May. 1 Mailer left New Zealand for Australia^ sailing from Auckland, but an extradition warrant was issued and he was brought back under escort. There wat> some discussion as to whether a report made out by the Australian police was admissible &c evidence, and finally the Crown Prosecutor agreed | not to press his point. Mr. 0. A. L. Treadwell, submitted I that Mailer should be treated leniently by the Court. Prisoner had, when first employed by Kline, received good wages, and had fully lived up to his salary. Later, when the amount of work dropped off he had not the strength of character to curtail his ex' penditure, and misappropriated the gems, upon' which he had raised comparatively small sums of money at various dealers' shops. It was to be noted that he: had not raised anything like the sum in that manner which he could have gathered by the actual sale of the gems. Prisoner had said, and there were points in the depositions which bore him out^ that he was going to Sydney with the intention of raising money to make good his offence, and, counsel pointed out, Mailer had since done everything in his power to make good the defalcations. His Honour characterised Mailer's thefts as deliberate, and he agreed with the Probation Officer that the case was not one for probation. A sentence of one year's hard labour was imposed. A BAD START. Three youths, Leo Patrick Ellison (17 £ years of age), |Charles Norris (16 years), and Herbert Roland Crawford (17 years), were next placed in the dock upon a series of charges of breaking and [entering, chiefly private dwellings at Wellington and Auckland. Norris, for whom Mr. C. E. Leicester appeared, admitted participation 'in fourteen acts of breaking and entering, and as an explanation of his'frequent lapses counsel offered the effects of faulty parental control. . The boy , had been once previously in trouble, for Ije had stolen a £5 note when he was a child of ten, but, said counsel, there t was a weak rather than a criminal streak in the lad. His first success in breaking and entering had led him on ti> others, but when arrested at Auckland he realised that the game was up and gave' the police every assistance in clearing up the trouble.

James Lawrenco Hay, General Secretary for the V.M.C.A., gave evidence as to his observations' of Norris during the period that he was a member ot the' boys' department of the V.M.C.A. Witness considered that the weak streak in the lad's character might be eradicated if he were kept under proper control, such as members of the Rotary Club had offered to exercise over him.

Ellison and Crawford wore not represented by counsel, and had nothing to say.

His Honour said that he was satisfied' from the reports made by the Probation Officer that- Norris and Ellison require much stricter discipline than they could receive tinder probation,, and he would therefore impose upon theni sentences of six months' imprisonment, with a recommendation, under the' Industrial Schools Act, that they should be transferred to a Borstal or other industrial [ institution. Apparently Crawford had led a decent life until he gave up farm I wtoTk and came to town, and>he would ! be placed on probation for a term of three years, one of the conditions of that probation being that he should not at any time during that period reside in a large town without the express permission of the Probation Officer. THEFT? OF £35. William Strath, 26 years of age, who had admitted the theft of £35 from a money belt which had been left hanging an the bathroom of a boardinghouse at Thorndon, was next called. -Mr. Treadwell made an application that prisoner should be admitted; to probation, but ibis Honour, after referring to two previous convictions of "theft recorded against the prisoner, ordsred that he should be detained for a period of reformative treatment ,not exceeding two years. . ...