KING’S COUNSEL’S LAPSES.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 7 September 1932, Page 6

KING’S COUNSEL’S LAPSES.

MAY NOT* LIVE TO MEET ACCUSATIONS. (Sun Special). WINNIPEG, Monday. John A. Machray, K.C., leading Winnipeg barrister,, who is accused or misappropriating University and Church trust funds so that losses of more than £500.000 have accrued,, may not live to meet the accusations. He is 67 years old and broken in health. Unable to make payments when his figures showed that he should n&ve hundreds of thousands of pounds in the bank, Machray was arrested last week and charged with stealing funds from the Bursar's Office of the University of Manitoba. His trial will take place next month. , , Auditors' examination has revealed that the irregularities had been on for the last 20 years, and that bad investments as well as seeming peculations had made up the sum of loss. Regarded as independently wealthy , and looked up to as an outstanding citizen, devoting himself to public service, Machray's associates-had such con - dence in him that the audits of his accounts were a* mere formality, and the Controller-General of the Treasury of the province of Manitoba “O.K.'d' his accounts each year. Machray was Bursar of the University ’ and Chancellor of the Anglican Church treasury, handling the central funds for all Western Canada. The Aged Clergymen’s Retirement Fund, guaranteeing them a pension has been obliterated, and church credits built up through many years of painful saving have been virtually wiped out.

* /There is not £50,000 left out of total church funds exceeding £300,000.