SUPREME COURT

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 February 1937, Page 5

SUPREME COURT

LABOURER’S MEAN THEFT., [pee peess association.] INVERCARGILL, February. 19. After a retirement of 20 minutes the iurv returned with a verdict of guilty in tbe case in which Henry Hunt Manson, labourer, formerly ot the Public Works camp at Milford, was charged with the theft of £4l, the property of Samuel Innes, a fellow workef at Milford. The accused in evidence said he had put the money, which had been given to him by Innes to give to Innes’s brother, in a canvas bag. When he arrived at Bluff he and

two other men hired a taxi and came to Invercargill. On arrival here he found that the hag was missing. He made enquiries and eventually found the bag at the left luggage office, but the money had gone. “You have been found guilty ot a very mean theft of the earnings of a fellow employee,” said Mr. Justice Kennedv,’ in sentencing accused to imprisonment for one month with hard labour. AUCKLAND CRIMINALS. AUCKLAND, February 19. Of five prisoners who came before Mr Justice Callan for sentence, three were declared by him to be habitual criminals because of their previous records of convictions. A salesman, aged 26, Clement Robert Lawson, and a labourer, aged 41, George Frederick Murphy, who had been caught breaking into a store at Pokeno, stood jointly charged with breaking and entei ing by night with intent to commit a crime, and with having in their possession instruments for house-break-ing. There was a further charge against Murphy alone of having in his possession an explosive substance for the purpose of committing a crime. Mr. J. J. Sullivan, appearing for both men, said friends of Lawson outside the Dominion had undertaken to give him work. 6 His Honor- said that raised a question that had been discussed before. “I do not think New Zealand courts should facilitate the transhipment and unloading on to other courts of our misfits,” he continued. “We produced them.” Each would be‘sentenced to one year’s imprisonment with hatd labour, and declared an'habitual criminal. ANONYMOUS LETTER. HAMILTON, February 19Strong censure on the anonymous sender of a letter to him about a prisoner was passed by Mr. Justice Fair after sentencing a man in the Supreme Court at Hamilton this morning. “I have received in connection with this prisoner an anonymous letter which proposes to draw my attention to certain facts which I could consider in imposing sentence’,” he said. “It should be known by this time that any communication of this kind amounts to contempt of court and interference with the administration of justice, for which the law provides punishment.” His Honor added that if a person wished to bring notices to the court it could be done through the proper channels, the probation officer or the Crown solicitor. On an indecent assault charge a Maori, Tuahu Ranui, aged 42, of Otoro hanga, was sentenced to two years reformative detention. For the theft of sums totalling £469 between May to November, 1936 Leslie John Weal, aged 34, was sen fenced to ‘l2 months’ imprisonment.