THE SEDITIONS SENTENCES.

Gisborne Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 4875, 22 May 1918, Page 5

THE SEDITIONS SENTENCES.

CHRISTCHURCH MEN TO BE RE- . LEASED: NO CONSIDERATION EOR REV. CHAPPELL. Press Association Telegram. WELLINGTON, May 21. The Government has considered the appeals on behalf of Messrs Hunter, Flood and Langeley, imprisoned at Christchurch for sedition, and lias decided to advise their' release on condition that each man enters into a bond, with two sufficient sureties, each in the sum of £SO, to he of good behaviour for twelve months and especially during that period to abstain from all acts and utterances having any seditious tendency. The Acting Prime Minister, in a statement, said the Government considered that the observations of the Magistrate when pronouncing judgment- were entirely justified by the facts proved and, considering the nature and circumstances of the offence, the sentences were lenient. The only circumstances which weighed with the Government in favour of the prayer for remission was that the seditious nature of the resolution drafted by Flood, proposed by Langley and seconded by Hunter, was not obvious to the Mayor, who presided, to the public men on the platform who abstained from a protest, or to a large number of persons who voted in favour of the motion when put by the Mayor. If proof could have been obtained of active participation by other persons, a prosecution would have been instituted against, others as well as against the three prisoners but prooff sufficient for a . crimma case was only available against the th Sb' James Allen added that the Government had not dealt with the case of the Rev Air Chappie, which, he said, was not m the same cate-o-orv as the others, jw would receive no consideration whatevei at the hands of the Government.