JUDGE REFUSES TO REDUCE SENTENCE

Manawatu Times, Volume LII, Issue 6454, 11 November 1927, Page 6

JUDGE REFUSES TO REDUCE SENTENCE

AUSTRALIAN WITH A BIG LIST, (Per Press Association!. AUCKLAND, Last . Night. An application by Ernest Charles Townsend, aged 32, fo t - a reduction of the sentence of twelve months’ hard labour and two years’ reformative detention imposed by Mr. F. K. Hunt, S.M., on on e charge of theft and three of false pretences was refused by Mr, Justice Herdman in the Supreme Court. Townsend said the sentences passed upon him in Auckland was exactly four times heavier than that passed on -him in Wellington. He added that judging by the remarks of Mr. Hunt he was sentenced severely because he was an Australian.

His Honour: “You,were an Australian criminal when you came over here. It is a great pity th G country

cannot get rid of you again.” His Honour referred to prisoner's convictions in Australia for larceny and receiving in 1923 and again for larceny in 1924. Ho continued: “The police report states that you arrived .in New Zea-. land last July. Three weeks after you landed you married a woman whom you met on the boat. You represented to your wife’s father that you wer e the New Zealand representative of a largo Melbourne firm and by this means you obtained £ls.

“You also made arrangements to purchase a motor car and paid for it With a valueless cheque for £625. “You then obtained £5 from tho licensee of an Auckland hotel by means of a valueless cheque. On leaving' tho hotel you paid for your boa”d with a valueless cheque for £25. You stole an attache case and contents valued at £l6 from tho hotel.

“After spending som 0 time in Rotorua you came back to Auckland and left your wife destitute." His Honour added that prisoner then went to Wellington where ho stole a suit of clothes and a chequebook, and gave the licensee of a hotel a worthless cheque for £ls,

“I do not propose to read more,” he said. “I have come to tie conclusion that there is no need to interfere with tho judgment of Mr. Hunt. Tho application win be dismissed."