SKIPPER LOST HIS SHIP

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXXII, Issue 58, 6 May 1924, Page 6

SKIPPER LOST HIS SHIP

,UNLAWFUL USE OF BICYCLE. Gisbornc, May 2. The attention of the Magistrate's Court was occupied this morning in the hearing of a case in which James Richmond, master of the schooner War Lord, was charged that he diet unlawfully and without color of right, but not so as to ba guilty of theft thereof, convert to his own use one bicycle, valued at £lO. the property of Ronald Wilkinson. The accused, who was represented by Mr A. Whitehead, pleaded guilty. ' Senior-Sergeant Filzpatrick said that on April %i an employee of the Gisborne Publishing Company Ronald Wilkinson, left his bicycle on the premises, but on going for it later he found it mis-sing. The offence was a, daily occurrence in the town, ancj it was veiy hard to detect. He thought,,, an example should be made when the charge was sheeted home. Employees had to leave their bicycles about the premises. For the defendant Mr Whitehead said that the case was closely asso-< Ciated with the cases which had been heard hist week. The crew bad been missing when the ship was to sail, and the master had bad to search the different hotels. Throughout) the. whole day "o f°°d was served on the ship, and the circumstances were so difficult that it would have confused a much older man than the captain was. In searching the hotels he became helplessly drunk, and was quite unconscious of what was taking: place. In one of the hotels he had a difference with a man, and he had been, chased round. fn order to get away he had taken the bicycle. He had lost his ship through the act, and as far as New* Zealand was: concerned he had practically lost his profession. Senior-Sergeant Fitzpatrick said it was true that the man had been drinking during the day, but at time "found with the bicycle he bad sobered up again. The Magistrate said that this was the first case of the kind that bad' pome before "hi iii, and he would issue a first and final warning. Tn this case he would impos .-.> a fine, but in future he would imr-nse a term ol imprisonment. Tn this ease he would fine accused £6 and costs.