SUBVERSIVE REMARKS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 210, 3 August 1940, Page 10

SUBVERSIVE REMARKS.

PENALTY INFLICTED. Per Press Association. AUCKLAND, Aug. 2. A prohibition against addressing public meetings or taking any part in public movements associated with the Communist political organisaton was part of the sentence imposed by Air Justice Fair, in the Supreme Court, on Alexander Drcnnan, a watersider, who was found guilty by a jury of , having made subversive statements in contravention of the Public Safety Emergency Regulations at a street meeting in the course of the Auckland West by-election in'May last. Asked what he had to say, Drcnnan said he had always based his polities on the best interests of tho working class, and what ho considered the best interests of the people of New Zealand. He called Edward A. Girven, secretary of the Waterside Workers’ Union, to testify to his honesty and working ability. The Judge remarked that prisoner had been previously sentenced for procuring lawlessness and inciting disorder, also that he had been convicted for assault and obstructing the police, also obstructing a public place. The jury had made a strong recommendation to mercy on the grounds that the statements were made in the heat of the election campaign.-No single individual was entitled to set up Ills own individual opinion, against that of file community as expressed by the law; that was what prisoner had repeatedly tried to do. Despite prisoner’s past record, however.' he' had decided to treat him in the same way as had been done with a fellow Communist, Morey. He would be released on probation for three years on the usual statutory conditions, and also ordered to pav £23 towards the costs of the prosecution.