IMPRISONED LAWYER’S APPEAL

Evening Star, Issue 18280, 21 May 1923, Page 2

IMPRISONED LAWYER’S APPEAL

ADDRESS TO FULL COURT. NO REDUCTION. Reginald Boyes, a young English solicitor, who last' month, in the Melbourne Criminal Court, pleaded guilty to having converted to his own use debentures valued at £SOO, the property of Mr and Mrs Talbot L. Barrington, and who received frqm Mr Justice Macfarlan an exemplary sentence of three years’ imprisonment, stood before tho Victorian Full Court, consisting of Mr Schutt, Mr Justice JPArthur, and Mr Justice Weigall, recently, and launched one of the strangest appeals heard in criminal jurisdiction for some time (says the Melbourne ‘ Ago’). Well groomed and manicured, Boves arrived in court with a bundle of red-taped papers, resembling tho customary legal brief, and commenced to address the learned judges upon his “innocence.” Mr Justice Schutt: But you have not applied for leave to appeal against your conviction? You pleaded guilty. Prisoner smiled and bowed. “ I understand that, your Honor,” ho said. “ I realise that I am estopped, hy my plea of guilty, from appealing against my conviction.' But I wish to point out that 1 pleaded guilty to the misappropriation of certain debentures, though, as a matter of fact, the debentures were not issued to the public for some weeks later. 1 was really in tho position of a sub-underwriter, and sold certain ‘equities,’ not debentures.” Mr Justice Schutt: What you call equities was something that belonged to somebody else. Boyes; Yc-cs. Mr Justice Schutt: Then what have you to say on tho question of excessive sentence? That is what you have asked leave to appeal against. ADDITIONAL PUNISHMENT. Prisoner moistened bis lips, and, reclining his chin in bis himself to brief reflection. Brightening, and with a self-deprecatory smile, bo confessed that ho would “ have to proceed on quite other grounds” in that matter. He desired, and would make, restitution if released. “ Being a solicitor, your Honor, my conviction is bound to lead to my being struck off the rolls, and it is a very serious punishment to unfrock a professional man and ask him to carry on. It is like taking the microscope from a scientist and asking him to carrv on.” 1 Mr justice Schutt; You are not asked to carrv on. . Boyes: But a mn.n must make a living somehow. I havo to go bciore another tribunal. I must inevitably bo. struck off the roils. I must # suffer the disgrace and punishment- of being unfrocked, pendents will suffer. # At this stage prisoner’s voice shook a little, as if the contemplation of this state' of affairs caused him pain, and he paused ns if to recover himself. " When this took place,” ho resumed, “I was in serious domestic trouble, as vonr Honors know, having had to deal with mv domestic affairs on several occasions. ‘Mv mind was unsettled I was practically homeless. I am not (prisoner smiled at his little joke) much better off now, vour Honor.” FAMILY HISTORY. Prisoner proceeded to say that these disabilities and his inevitable punishment before another tribunal were possibly not in the judge’s mind when he imposed the heavy sentence of three years’ imprisonment. “It is possibly presumption on my part, your Honors,” he said, “to you that certain legislation empowers you to give a juvenile offender a chance, and I suggest that this legislation is equally applicable to a man who has reached half bis allotted span without making a mistake. Mv brothers and sisters are worth about L40.0C0. I myself have a life interest in £2,000 in my father’s .estate. It was the knowledge of this money that made me careless. If your Honors could release me on a. bond, I could work m\ passage to England, and it would be strange indeed if I could not make some arrangements for restitution.” Here prisoner appeared to have a second momentary breakdown. He proceeded : “Should I tell yon about my career? Perhaps I should not. However, I may say that my father was a doctor of Cambridge University, and worked up a substantial practice' of fifty years’ standing, I was articled to a legal firm of 150 years’ standing. It has produced at least one judge to date—Sir Henry Hawkins. I rnmo to Australia immediately ..after serving my articles, and, with the exception of a period when I worked as locum te.nens for Mr Sutton, of Camperdown, I served with a firm of Melbourne solicitors right up to the date of my enlistment, which took place when Conscription had just been turned down and men were badly needed.” For the third and last time prisoner’s voice broke. With bowed head he played tho stump of his lead pencil nervously against his teeth. As he did not look up this time ho was asked if he had anything further to say. “Nothing else,” ho said. COURT DECLINES TO INTERFERE. “A great deal of what prisoner has said,” Mr Justice Schutt remarked, “is irrelevant. There is nothing to indicate that Bayes’s desire to make restitution is genuine, and that he would be able to do it. Tho severe punishment of being struck off tho rolls must have been present in the judge's mind when ho imposed tho term of three years’ imprisonment, and the only question for the Full Court to consider in relation to this undoubtedly severe, but deserved, sentence is whether tho learned judge acted upon wrong principles and whether the sentence was manifestly cxces sive. Tho court does not find in tho affirmative on cither question. The application will ho dismissed. Prisoner must servo Iris sentence.”

“As your Honor pleases,’’ replied Boyes, with a bow. The court further decided that the time already served by Boyes, ponding his appeal, should not count as part of his sentence. The appeal was “ not reasonable,” held the judges. Dumb on this occasion, Boyes grasped his hat and papers and hurried from the court, acknowledging os ho passed on the sympathetic .nod of a fellow prisoner-—a working man —-who was seated on the back bench, Availing his turn for a “ try on.” Outside the court the “ lawyer bloke,” as one guttural-voiced waiting appellant was heard to refer to him, extended his wrists and received back the handcuffs, and later, in company of his lowly follows, was driven in Black Maria to Melbourne Gaol.

Gaol is a great leveller