ITALIAN GIRLS

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 112, 7 November 1935, Page 25

ITALIAN GIRLS

BANISHMENT FOR CRIME?

Two young Italian girls, completing their education in London, and living at a convent hostel at Hampstead, stood in the dock at Marylebone recently. They recently sat for their final examination before returning home, says the: "Daily Telegraph." Giulia Campi, 20 years old, cried silently all the time she was in court. Igini Sbardella, aged 22, listened impassively to a story which, it was suggested, may result in both the girls being banished from their homes, where traditions of honour are particularly strict. They pleaded guilty to stealing ninety-two articles from two West End stores. They were seen by the police to take a suitcase and. go from counter to counter—stealing. "It is true; I will pay; don't take me; I will kill myself with sorrow." exclaimed Sbardella when arrested. "It is true. I stole, but I will pay." said Campi. Their solicitor pleaded earnestly. "These poor unfortunate girls are well connected." their solicitor said. "They came to this country in July to learn English and to improve their education. If they are deported it will be a terrible disgrace." Mr. Ivan Snell, the Magistrate, said the fact that they were well connected and educated made matters worse. They were not poor peonle struggling to make ends meet. He passed sentence of one month in the second division and then deportation. Later in the day Mr. Hazel, their solicitor, made another appeal. Campi's grandmother, he said, whose husband was in the Italian Embassy at Brussels, was to have come to take her home. "You are asking me not to punish them for their offence," Mr. Snell replied: "Why should th°y go about the world for the rest of their lives as if they were honest, decent people? I have been very lenient in not giving them six months. Next case, please." There followed two attractive-look-ing young married women. They were handbag thieves and had been previously convicted. Mr. Snell said he remembered their faces. He told them that their appearanvo, when working together "as a team." would call attention to them. Surely they must realise that they could not "get away with it." They pleaded guilty to bein3 suspected persons loitering in Oxford Street with intent to steal from women's handbags. They were seen to make two attempts to open bags. Ten weeks' hard labour was the sentencp