SERIOUS ASSAULT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23442, 5 March 1938, Page 4

SERIOUS ASSAULT

LABOURER ATTACKS GIRL IMPRISONMENT WITH HARD LABOUR A sentence of three years and six •months' imprisonment with hard labour was imposed on Albert Robert Wilcoxson, a labourer, 31 years of age, who appeared for sentence in the Supreme Court yesterday morning on a charge of attempted rape, on a girl 18 years of age. Mr Justice Kennedy presided.

Mr 6. G. Stevens, Who represented the prisoner, said that so far as the girl was concerned he had been instructed that she had made nO gesture or sign, or given any encouragement to the prisoner to lead him to believe that she would be a 1 consenting party. The accused admitted that, the attack had been the result of, a sudden impulse on his part, The accused's early life was almost a tragedy. When he was 13 years,of age his parents died and he wa's* thrown on the world an orphans' without relatives to assist him. ■ He was 'committed under the Child Welfare ; '<-Act ; arid was employed by a : farmer, by whom he was treated well, for a year and >half, but with his second employer he was not so happy. He ran away and.was subsequently committed to the Borstal-Institute, where he made associations .which were not. to his benefit. When he was released he was thrown among undesirable companions, and shortly afterwards, •when he was short of money, he committed theft for which he was imprisoned. In 1933, after a" series of offences, he was imprisoned for. 12, months, and after his release cpmmitted no further offences involving dishonesty or any other kind of misdemeanour until the present case. Despite the fact that he had been almost cradled in misfortune he had endeavoured to go straight during the past few years, and up till the present had succeeded against a good deal of adversity. With reference to the present case, counsel continued, there was no doubt that a certain amount of violence was used, but the girl had suffered no physical injury. The accused had been overcome by an impulse and that induced him to commit the offence. He was a man of obviously weak character. He had pleaded guilty and had saved the girl the embarrassment of appearing in the court. He had also been frank with the police, and "in view of his unfortunate upbringing counsel asked that the accused be shown such leniency as was compatible with justice. The Crown Prosecutor (Mr F. B. Adams) said that the crime was a determined and violent attempt to ravish a young girl, and was *an offence of a very serious character. , His Honor said that the prisoner appeared for sentence on a serious crime of attempting to commit rape. He had accosted a girl 18 years of age, a complete stranger, on the road and had endeavoured to effect his purpose. The girl had had a very fierce struggle and the prisoner had eventually desisted from his purpose. He would be sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour for three years and six months.