POLICE COURT DIVORCE

Greymouth Evening Star, 19 April 1938, Page 8

POLICE COURT DIVORCE

MAGISTRATE’S SUGGESTIONS LONDON, March 3. Police-court divorces were advocated last night by Sir Gervais Rentpul, the West London magistrate, when he addressed the City ot London Tradesmen’s Club on “Where justice never sleeps, or the life of a London ‘beak.’ ” “it is to" the police-courts, he said, “that thousands of married couples come every year to obtain what js, to many of them, the only available remedy, the only one they can allotd for a domestic life of unutterable misery, a judicial separation. “This, more often than not, is worse than useless. I am certain that it would "be an enormous advantage if decrees of divorce could be obtain’cTih the courts of summary jurisdiction. As issues to be tried are almost the same "as in a case of separation, it cannot be suggested 'that a stipendiary magistrate is not competent, to deaf with such matters:’’ Other points from Sir Gervais’ speech were: '"'‘‘Master criminals” of the type described by Conan Doyle and Edgar ’Wallace" might'exist, but he had nev‘er'seen airyfTfi.ng like one. ~"The?'yast'' : mhjOrity- of criminals are they have" not the brains 'dr th(T iiftlttstry to do anything else. "-"The'-whole' position- of the betting laws. is. entirely anomalous. Here n is 'really. a;ca-se : of-one law for the rich ■an'd - another-for the poor. •-■•'•-T-iie -worst-; place for- getting one’s ■^pr'crclrßtr'pTCk&d'-’biis stop. The most unlikely looking people are pickpock--Shoplifting is almost exclusively confined to women. r I