GUILTY OF ARSON

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21345, 21 November 1932, Page 11

GUILTY OF ARSON

CASE AT HAMILTON

BILLIARD SALOON FIRE

FIVE YEARS' DETENTION

COMMENT BY THE JUDGE

[from our own correspondent] HAMILTON, Saturday The trial of Ira George Land, aged 36, on a charge of wilfully netting fire to A. G. Forbes' billiard saloon at Frankton on August 21, was continued in the Hamilton Supreme Court to-day. The prosecution had been conducted by Mr. Gillies and Mr. Sullivan appeared for the accused. In summing up to-day His Honor, Mr. Justice Herdman, said the evidence showed that the billiard saloon had been deliberately set fire to by the use of petrol. It was common ground that the petrol tins found on the premises had been taken there by Land. Accused had admitted in the witness box that the statements he had made to the police regarding the disposal of the petrol were untrue, and that he wanted to shield the witness Sheehy from being prosecuted for driving an unregistered vehicle. His Honor said the jury was entitled to regard with suspicion the postponed alibi. Not one word of the defence had . been mentioned to the police. His Honor described as unreliable the evidence of that witness Iloskings. After a retirement of an hour the jury, ~ returned a verdict of guilty.

In imposing sentence of two years' hard labour, to be followed by three years' reformative detention, His Honor said ha agreed with the jury's verdict. Arson, he said, was one of the most serious offences the Court had to deal with. Land had used a highly-inflammable liquid and in a few seconds the place was a sheet of flames. But for the promptitude of the Hamilton Fire Brigade the fire would no doubt have spread and lives might have been endangered. Continuing, His Honor said the police report regarding Land's character was an unsatisfactory one. He was described as a criminal of a bad type and had been convicted before of a crime so serious-that he had received a sentence of three years' imprisonment. '