YOUNG MAN’S BAD RECORD

New Zealand Times, Volume L, Issue 11437, 6 February 1923, Page 6

YOUNG MAN’S BAD RECORD

M OT'HE R-IN-L AW ’ S APPEAL. REFORMATIVE TREATMENT ORDERED. The tradition concerning the hardheartedness of mothers-in-law in general was set aside in the Supreme Court yesterday, when one made an unusual application for leniency on behalf of a son-in-law who had occasioned both her daughter and herself much trouble. She appealed for probation in the hop© that she might place him on a farm. The young man in question, Harold Avery Clayton, with numerous aliases, was described as a victim to drink and drugs. A shock-headed youth, smartly dressed, he took" tho situation he found himself in very seriously. He was said to he a veterinary surgeon, and was an arrival from Canada. Mr P. J. O’Regan, for the prisoner, stated that war service had affected his head. “His mother-in-law has instructed me to say,” added counsel, “that she would be pleased to have him on a farm, which she is thinking of purchasing, anJ giving him a chance. He has only recently married her daughter.” She was a woman of considerable means, and a resident of Levin. His Honour, Mr Justice Chapman: Is this to be cured by. setting him at large ? “The police say that he is a born criminal,” announced Mr Macassey, “who makes no attempt to go straight. He arrived in New Zealand in 1919, and was convicted on four charges of forgery at Auckland an 1921. He was ordered two years’ reformative treatment. He is now charged with three charges of obtaining credit by means of false pretences at Palmerston North and two at Wellington. It was after he committed these offences that he married the girl at Levin. He afterwards went to Palmerston North and New Plymouth, where he also got. into trouble.” “I have been asked to give you another chance,” said His Honour. “You have had one or two already. I will give you a chance, hut it, will not he the kind you want. I cannot overlook the past.” He would like to give him a chance for the offer made by hie indulgent mother-in-law, and in granting reformative treatment, was possibly stretching matters somewhat. The sentence of the court was three years’ reformative treatment. . “1 would like to give your mother-in-law a chance,” commented the judge.