THREE YEARS' GAOL

Evening Post, Volume CXXVII, Issue 110, 12 May 1939, Page 11

THREE YEARS' GAOL

ABORTION CHARGE

"SERIOUS AND DANGEROUS"

Stressing the serious view taken by the law of the crime of abortion, Mr. Justice Smith in the Supreme Court today imposed a sentence of three years' imprisonment with hard labour jupon Percy Reginald Speers, aged 42, (a draper, who had been found guilty 'by a jury of illegally using an instrument with intent to procure a miscarriage. Mr. M. R. Watterson, who appeared for the prisoner, asked and was given leave to withdraw the point of law which he had previously asked to be reserved for the Court of Appeal. Counsel said that he had since found two decisions which made the point untenable.

His Honour said that counsel had taken the proper course. The two cases referred to showed quite clearly that the trial of the prisoner had been conducted in accordance with the law.

Pleading for leniency for the prisoner, Mr. Watterson said it might be assumed in his favour that in committing the offence he was substantially only doing the bidding of the woman in the case. The jury's rider that it considered the woman to have been a consenting party was referred to by Counsel in support of his contention. Speers's case differed, said counsel, from those of persons who \ performed the actual operation, gener- j ally for profit for themselves. In this; case there was no gain or profit for' the prisoner, and counsel submitted that he could not be considered an abortionist in the generally accepted sense of the term. The prisoner was a divorced man with two children of his own. He was of sober habits and disposition, and the report of the probation officer mentioned his good character. Counsel asked for probation. • "SATISFACTORY VERDICT." "The jury have found you guilty on the first count of procuring the „ miscarriage of this woman, although they added that the woman herself was a consenting party in all the transactions," said his Honour to Speers. "That rider is no doubt accurate, and the verdict itself is entirely satisfactory, and in my judgment thoroughly supported by the evidence. They found you not guilty on the second count, namely, of inciting the woman to permit an instrument to be used on her. No doubt they came to that conclusion because they thought the woman was a consenting party and did not need to be incited. They found you not guilty on the third and fourth counts of supplying and attempting to supply a noxious thing.

"But the count on which you have been convicted is a very serious one," continued his Honour. "There is no doubt that you made all the arrangements for the operation and that you aided and abetted in the commission of it. I find it difficult to distinguish between you and the actual performer of the operation, though, of course, she is not before the Court.

"The law regards this offence as both serious and dangerous—serious because the crime is- against morality and is anti-social in its effects, and dangerous because the life of the woman, though" a consenting party, is placed in peril in the hands of an unqualified operator.

"I have to maintain the law, and the only way in which I can do that is by imposing a substantial sentence of imprisonment."