THEFT OF BICYCLE.

Manawatu Standard, Volume L, Issue 117, 14 April 1930, Page 7

THEFT OF BICYCLE.

GAOL OFFENDER. LABOURER IN COURT. Charges of the theft of a bicycle valued at £4. the property of John Gardiner Woolf, and of another valued at £9. tho property of Arthur James Cooksley, were preferred against Albert Reginald Pfulena, of Palmerston North, at the Magistrate’s Court, this morning, before Mr J. L. Stout, S.M. Mr McLeavey appeared for accused, who'elected to be dealt with summarily and pleaded guilty to the first charge, but not guilty to the second. Constable Goodwin stated- th.it following a complaint by Mr Cooksley, he interviewed accused in respect of tho second charge. The latter stated that he was a labourer, and that he had missed his own' bicycle and h.id taken another from behind tho Rosy Theatre. It transpired that he had not ridden a bicycle into town that niglrt, his own being in a repair shop whero it was held because the proprietor refused to extend credit to him.

Mr McLeavey: Do you know how pinny bicycles accused had in his possession on April 5, legally or otherwise? —Three, including the one in the repair shop. Mr McLeavey stated that Hulcna had been definitely under the impression that he had ridden his cycle into town as was his usual custom. Find ing it had disappeared, he took another, like other people often did. The Magistrate: I trust that everybody else does not do that. Mr McLeavey stated that Hulena forbade his boys to ride the machino and on the Monday morning made inquiries concerning its ownership. Accused stated that, on Saturday niglrt, April 6, he was in town with his boy. At about 9.30 p.m. he went into an alleyway to get his bicycle, on which he was pnder the impression he had come into town. Finding it not there, he decided that someone else bad taken his, and so he took another. Sergeant Hill: Why did you not bring this bicycle round to the police station?—l did not know that 1 was required to do that. Accused denied that on the night the bicycle was taken he had sent his son to obtain his machine from the repair shop, and that the boy had returned to say the shop was shut. The Magistrate: Even if he is not guilty to this charge, he comes under the other provision which applies to people who take other’s cars without authority. Mr McLeavey: Unquestionably I would plead guilty to a charge of conversion.

Mr McLeavey said that for a long time past Hulena’s family affairs had been most unhappy, but conditions had substantially changed ill the last tew weeks, and imprisonment would only inflict punishment on his wife and children. One of his sons had a bicycle and the other had been pestering him fof.one. That accounted for the theft of the first machine. There was some element of probability that his story concerning the second charge was correct. The Magistrate: I think that there is very little. Here is a man who says he left his bicycle on one alleyway and then went somewhere else to take another.

Mr McLeavey asked that a term of imprisonment should not be inflicted. Detailing the circumstances associated with the first charge, Sergeant Hill stated that accused had the machine in his possession for a month and had re-enamelled it. He had taken it from behind a theatre. The Magistrate stated that he was afraid he could not, under the circumstances, fino accused or admit him to probation. The first offence had been deliberate. If there was any excuse for the second offence it was that accused’s own machine had been taken by mistake, but he had gone somewhere else to take the bicycle of rn innocent party and ride it home. Accused had to be taught a lesson and would bo sentenced to one month’s imprisonment on each chargp. His Worship intimatecl that on the Second charge he had convicted accused under Section 32 of the Police Offiences Act, the terms of jmprisonine.nt to be concurrent.