POSED AS CONSTABLE

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 93, 21 April 1931, Page 11

POSED AS CONSTABLE

YOUNG MAN IMPRISONED

"NEEDS HARD WORK-

(By Telegraph.)! ". ; : (Special to "The Evening Post") PALMBRSTON'N., This Day. A young man who pqsed as a constable and-a detective made "the"excuse that it was an April Fool's Bay joke, but Mr. J. L. Stout, S.M., did not accept,the excuse, and'gent him to gaol for two months, with the comment: "He needs hard, work— that's what he wants." '. . , -.. .: ;Norroan-.Jiilins. johansen, aged 21 years, was called upon to-answer a charge of assuming without authority the designation of a. constable in the New. Zealand Police Force The other count was that, at Palmerston North on 20th March, he was deemed to be an idle and disorderly person. The accused pleaded guilty to botn Detective Russell declared" that : the accused had only recently been convicted for vagrancy and .had.then been ordered to come up for sentence if called upon within six months. Johansen: had subsequently refused .relief work," while, with- a companion,- he had left Ms lodging-house without paying his-board. He did not seem to want work. , l j t."The first time accused represented nunself to be a constable he.told a man m a restaurant to 'come inside.with him and then produced his own probation papers, declaring that the description of the man he had accosted corresponded ■with that 01 a person suspected of breaking and entering," said Detective Kussell. The accused had been warned by the police not to repeat these impersonations. .Recently the police were summoned: to settle a family disturbance which occured at midnight, but on the arrival of the. constables, they were.told that everything was then quite all right as a detective had been down, said Detective, llussell. "Later, our inquiries disclosed that 'the detective had been Johansen and that he. had gone through the house." ~,, . iT It was further pointed put that the accused had gone to a-lounge in the city representing himself to be a bakehouse inspector, but the proprietor had refused him admittance, stating that there was no bakery on the premises. At the present time the accused-had opened an office as a debt collector.. : ■ The Magistrate imposed a sentence 01 two months' imprisonment,.with hard labour on the accused for representing himself to be a constable and fined him £1, in default a month with hard labour, on the charge of which he was previously ordered to come up for sentence.