JURYMEN ABUSED

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 134, 4 December 1930, Page 10

JURYMEN ABUSED

OPEN THREATS MADE

ECHO OF SALAMAN SENTENCE

(By Telegraph.) (Special to "The Eveninrj Post.") NEW PLYMOUTH, This Day. Members of the jury which tried the Salaman case are asking themselves what protection they can obtain against the abuse that they arc receiving from certain members of the community who are personally dissatisfied with the punishment meted out to Salaman by the law for his crime. The topic of Salaman 's scntonco is still very much discussed in Taranaki. Jurymen who heard that ease have been accosted on numerous occasions— many times in public—and subjected to heated criticism, while members who are in business have been threatened by former customers with discontinuance of patronage. One member told an interviewer that at least a dozen people had declared that they would take their custom elsewhere in consequence of the man having served on the jury which found Salaman guilty. Numbers of dissatisfied citizens have upbraided jurymen for not having considered the fact that Salaman has reputedly done a lot of good. Soon after the case concluded, said a gentleman who was interviewed, one man had stated his extreme views in a juryman's shop. "I don't think I'll lose over it," said the juryman, "but it is not a pleasant situation to be placed in, and there is a, prospect of losing ia small amount of business through having served on that jury. Wo made a strong recommendation for mercy after finding Salaman guilty, and our part should end there, although it seemed strange that the_ recommendation was not mentioned in Court." Another juryman told a similar story. "Quite a number of people have given us gentle hints that we will be _ made to suffer for the part we played in the case," he said. "We have been charged with not considering the good that Salaman has done. That had nothing to.do with us or the case. As an instance, one woman 'told me off' in public, and so conducted herself that, had the police been present, she might have been charged. The people are talking about the ease everywhere, and one is alluded to as 'Salaman,' and addressed: 'Hullo, Salamanl' I think it is about time some action was taken by somebody to see that jurymen are freed from criticism of the manner in which they discharge their duties, and especially criticism in public that may prove detrimental to business." 1 ___-^_—i^—