FORGERS SENTENCED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 14225, 23 November 1909, Page 6

FORGERS SENTENCED.

"A REMARKABLE CAREER." J [BY TELEGKAPH.-'-rnESS ASSOCIATION.] ■ Chbistchtjbch, Monday. At the Supreme Court to-day George Allen was found guilty on two counts of having forged cheques. The prisoner said that he was 47 years of age, and he asked the Court to take into consideration the fact that he was already undergoing a sentence of 12 months' imprisonment. He also drew attention to the accident which he had sustained owing to the capsize of the prison van last week, alleging that it was due to the police packing 16 men into a vehicle which should only have taken six. He had to go back to the hospital at night. His Honor said that if the matter had been a trifling one, he might' have set the prisoner's suffering to some extent against the offence which had been committed. The prisoner had had a most remarkable record, and seemed to have spent his life in gaol. There wore 24 convictions for various offences since 1897. He seemed to have an ingenious system of committing his frauds. The Habitual Criminals Act was intended to apply to men of the prisoner's description. The sentence of the Court would be three years' imprisonment, the prisoner to be dealt with as an habitual criminal. ; * * ' .

Llewellyn Price, who had pleaded guilty to forgery, and who was brought up for sentence, was sentenced to three years' hard labour, His Honor stating , that in consideration of prisoner's youth he would not declare him an habitual criminal. , -