BORSTAL YACHTSMAN

Grey River Argus, 29 April 1942, Page 5

BORSTAL YACHTSMAN

TO RETURN TO N.Z.

[Aust. & N.Z. Cable Assn.] (Rec. 9.40). HOBART, April 28. The bid for freedom by Richfird Cecil Hugh Humphreys,l who escaped from Borstal at Invercargill and sailed a yacht across the Tasman, ended in the Supreme Court to-day when Chief Justice Mirris dismissed the appeal against the Magistrate’s extradition order. Mr. H. Baker pleaded for Humphrey’s release. He said that this exploit in sailing a yacht single-handed across the Tasman stamped him as a man of courage, endurance, and ability. His parents in England had offered to make full restitution of any loss. They had even offered to pay his passage back to England to enable him to enlist in the Auxiliary Naval Force. Moreover, Humphreys was prepared to serve in any of the fighting forces in Australia. Mr. Baker argued that the New Zealand sentence of two years’ at a Borstal Institution for the theft of a lumber jacket. valued at forty shillings was savage and indefensible. The f-r Chief Justice, dismissing the appeal, X recalled previous convictions against ■ the. accused an New Zealand covering the theft of a yacht valued at £250 and a‘Sterling outboard motorboat., and also his previous escape from custody. Humphreys will be escorted back to New Zealand by Detective W. H. Cromwell, who has ‘been'in Hobart for several weeks awaiting the decision of the local Courts.