PENALTY OF CRIME.

Mataura Ensign, 26 May 1911, Page 5

PENALTY OF CRIME.

ri;u UNirn> i*nrss a-socivnoj* AUCKLAND, May 25. At the Supreme Court yesterday Walter Francis Darby, a bankrupt merchant. whose case was recently befor«» flu* Appeal Court, came up for sentence on s< ecu charges of breaches of the Bankruptcy Act. Mr Justice Chapman said that there was no evident of fraudulent intent; it «a»< rather a recklessness, |>erhaps carelessness. Taking into consideration what accuse,il-. had already suffered, he imposed only a nominal penally of ivvo monlhs' hard l labor, which would date from the conviction. and th< reioie would have been already served. Thomas McDonald, a clerk hi the Hank of New Zealand charged with theft and falsifying a ledger, was sentenced to » i;'ht months" hard latior.

Frederick Thomas Martyn, for theft from vessels, was scntcnivd to two years' on < ach of two charges, and Was declared a habitual criminal. Clinics Kiwi Wilkinson, a half-caste Maori, aged and CharleK Boyd, aged 21. were sentenced for forgery and and conspiracy to defraud. The former mcived 1H months' reformatory treatment on one charge ami was ordered to come up for sentence on the others, while Bovd was sentenced to IS months' imprisonment.