Solicitor Sent to Gaol For five Years

Manawatu Times, Volume 68, Issue 209, 3 September 1943, Page 5

Solicitor Sent to Gaol For five Years

(Per Press Association.) AUCKLAND, Sept. 2. A sentence of five years’ imprisonment was imposed by Mr. Justice Fair to-day on Huon Lucien Martyn Buisson, aged 39, a solicitor, of Auckland, for thefts of sums totalling £14,277 belonging to clients. The Judge said it waß painful to see a man only 39 and in good health physicaly and mentally appear for sentence on charges so grave. Qualified by ability and practice, he had abused a position of trust, stealing money entrusted by clients. He had continuea his thefts over the whole of the last 10 years. It was true that his clients presumably would not suffer any substantial loss, but his fellow practitioners, who guaranteed his honesty, would suffer and it was them he had robbed. Whatever difficulty prisoner may have encountered for a period, the fact remained that for 10 years he had been living in comparative luxury by stealing thousands from many clients who had trusted him. The duty of the Court in the circumstances was clearly to impose a sentence which would warn others. The least sentence the Court could impose was five years.