VICTIM TO PROMOTION

Greymouth Evening Star, 12 September 1944, Page 2

VICTIM TO PROMOTION

•SEAMAN’S RISE AND .FALL

AUCKLAND, September 11. The story of how a man who had previously lived an unblemished life succumbed to a sudden temptation was told by Mr Hubble to Justice Callan, at the Supreme Court, today, on behalf of a seaman, John Henry Wilson, who came up for sentence for theft of 2000 dollars and certain articles entrusted to him by a woman in Noumea to bring to her daughter in New Zealand. Counsel said that alter some years in a humble office in the ship’s engine rooms, Wilson got a position in the American transport service, which gave him commissioned rank and pay which amounted to about £ 130 a month. This large increase in wages and entry to a social plane in Noumea took him into a life with which he was not familiar, and he was ’introduced to drinking and gambling. As a result, Wilson was carried away, and used money entrusted to him to pay gambling debts.

The Judge said he accepted the view that Wilson had not designedly got the confidence of the elderly couple in Noumea, with the intention of betraying their trust. Nevertheless, he had been guilty of a grave crime and though a first offender would have been sent to gaol but for the difficulty such a sentence would create by frustrating and delaying restitution. Repayment had to be considered first. Wilson had disgraced not only himself and family, but also the British name and the name of New Zealand in Noumea.

The Judge admitted Wilson to probation for five years, one condition being that he assign his insurance policies as security and repay the sum of £6OO plus interest at 5 per cent, by instalments of £l2/10/-per month.