BOGUS MARRIAGES

Southland Times, Issue 19435, 26 December 1924, Page 2

BOGUS MARRIAGES

EX ASION OF ALIEN LAWS. DISGRACEFUL TRAFFIC. Behind the recent conviction for bigamy of a workless Hackney waiter lies a Scotland Yard campaign to stop a disgraceful traffic. French women of an undesirable class have been going to England, and by ■‘marriage” have become British subjects. They have thus evaded the possibility of deportation under the immigration laws. It is suggested that an elaborate organisation exists for facilitating such marriages. In the case heard at the Old Bailey, Harold Vere Witty was sentenced to four months’ imprisonment for bigamously marrying Marie Raymonde Lecomte, who disappeared after the ceremony at the Hackney Registry Office, and has not since been traced. An astonishing story was told. Witty, a waiter out of work, was introduced by a casual acquaintance to another man, and, though already married, consented to become a bridegroom for the second time. Next day he was hustled into a taxi-cab, in which he met the bride for the first time, and the couple were married at the local registry’ office. The cetemony over, the pair went to a house, where Witty was alarmed to find a man with a revolver handy. Pointing to £5 in Treasury notes, the man told Witty to take the money and get out. This he did, practically falling downstairs in his haste. He saw no more of his “bride,” and returned to his wife. The recorder told Witty that but for his previous good character he would have had to go to penal servitude, and expressed the hope that the police would soo be able to capture the person responsible fQr this terrible traffic. MARRIAGES OF CONVENIENCE. Inquires made by the Sunday News show that the heads of the organisation which deals in “marriages of convenience" are of French nationality, and that the arrest of Witty caused them to leave the country in a panic. It is well knowm to the police that a large number of French women of the underworld have gone to London during the last year or two. On landing they are met by agents who arrange for them to go through the marriage ceremony, men being paid small sums for acting as bridegrooms. Usually only men who are badly in need of money, or whose characters will not bear investigation are prepared to play such a risky role, and awkward situations have occasionally arisen. There have been cases where men not previously married have insisted on remaining with their “wives,” and this may explain the display of the revolver, at the house to which Witty went after the Hackney wedding. As a rule, however, the men are only too glad to get away after the ceremony. NEED FOR REVIVING LAW. “The difficulty in such cases," said a Scotland Yard authority, “it that the women will not speak the truth. They belong to the underworld of Paris, and their characters are so well known to the French police that they fear the consequences of deportation. Some of them come here ostensibly for a holiday, but once they are married there is no need for them to worry about registration. “Unless the traffic ceases our marriage laws may have to be altered so far as ceremonies at registry offices are concerned. At present it is easy for a man of British nationality to marry a woman of foreign extraction, and the cost is very small. Arrangements can be made even while a woman is coming over from France, and the registrar iA not under any obligation to ask too many questions bo long as the legal regulations are complied with.”