SIGNED UNDER THREAT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25660, 7 October 1944, Page 8

SIGNED UNDER THREAT

STATUS OF DOCUMENT COURT OF APPEAL FINDING (P.A.) WELLINGTON, Oct. 6. The Court of Appeal has given its decision on a case stated by Mr Justice Blair pursuant to section 442 of the Crimes Act, 1908. At the July sessions of the Wellington Supreme Court Walter Roy Webster was indicted on two counts—(a) that he assaulted Terence Francis Reilly so as to cause him actual bodily harm, and (b) that with intent to defraud by a threat that he would employ violence he did unlawfully compel Reilly to sign an agreement to transfer to his wife, Dorothy May Reilly, his half-share in a property at Oriental parade valued at £6OQO in order that it might afterwards be converted into a valuable security. The jury found Webster guilty on both counts. On the first he was sentenced to one. year’s imprisonment with hard labour, and on the second-he was remanded for sentence pending the decision of the Court of Appeal whether or not the document was a valuable security” as defined in the Crimes Act. , , „ _ . The unanimous decision of the Court of Appeal was that the document was “a valuable security.”