CRUELTY TO A BOY.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 29 January 1927, Page 5

CRUELTY TO A BOY.

CHAINED UP AT NIGHT. AN AMAZING STORY. BY CABLE—PRESS ASSOCIATION—COPYRIGU‘I SYDNEY, Jan. 28. An amazing story of cruelty to a boy was related in the Woollongong Police ,_ourt, when a boy’s aunt, Andrina Thompson, was charged with assaulting, rearing and ill-treating him. The boy, pale and emaciated, though he gave iiis age as twenty, looked about thirteen or fourteen. He said ne was chained with a dog chain at night, beaten with a stick and half A neighbour gave evidence that the boy was sometimes muzzled with a long, tapering funnel made of something like canvas, and cruelly beaten. Witness had heard the boy pleading for food. , The police evidence showed that the boy slept in a room which was used as a bathroom, laundry and lumber room combined. It had a cement floor and the bed consisted of a hoard about four feet long and two feet wide, with a chaff bag tied at each end and containing foul-smelling straw. An old coat served as a blanket. The boy told a constable that he had plain porridge for breakfast, plain potatoes for dinner, and dry bread tor tea. - J A medical man testified that the boy was slightly mentally deficient. He had numerous scars and bruises about the body. The boy’s father was the manager of a shop in Goulburn. The aunt was committed for trial.