PRISONER'S ESCAPE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18547, 3 November 1923, Page 13

PRISONER'S ESCAPE.

_. ♦ JUMPS FROM TRAINS. A REMARKABLE RECORD. Recently- the Now Sooth "Wales Government made an official explanation, on behalf of the police, respecting the escape of a prisoner from a train on a country line. . The matter was recalled at the Sydney Quarter Sessions last week, when the : details of ' the escape were furnished in evidence against Herbert Robert Stanley, aged 23 years, who pleaded guilty to eight charges of shopbreaking in the country. Stanley, who received a sentence of four years' imprisonment, and other sentences to be concurrent, was described by Judge Scholes to bo " a very dangerous criminal." It was stated that Stanley, in company with his brother, . Edmund Stanley, agedl 30 years, and John Charles Dangate, aged 18 years, was a passenger by the Southern train, which. arrived at . Strathfield on June 29. Detectives Geldart and Royal were waiting on the platform to intercept the three, when the accused dived through a carriage window as the train was moving, and he escaped. The other i two men were arrested. The escapee was subsequently arrested at Temora, but he tripped up a constable in the local lock-up and made a dash for liberty in and out of buildings, which included the hospital. He was caught, however, and. conveyed to Goulbourn Gaol. While under escort for Cootamundra, to stand his trial, Stanley lowered himself from ' a window of a fast-moving train and disappeared into' the bush. Later he returned to Temora, where the police found i him •under a bed, and he was forced to ' surrender. Stanley was then- transferred ' to Young Gaol, where the police learnt ' that he was associated with another pri- [ son or in plans to escape. A steel i bar and a pot of pepper was seized. Stanley 1 was then* conveyed to Long Bay Gaol. ] The accused lived,, in Temora, and went round the district on a motor bicycle \ commiting his depredations. Detective Geldart stated that he bef lieved Stanley to be the leader of a country shop-breaking gang. He had a reck- ' less disregard of consequences.