STARTING ANEW

Taranaki Daily News, 21 February 1930, Page 9

STARTING ANEW

‘PRAYING DICK” SET IREK SIXTEEN YEARS IN PRISON. Sydney, Feb. 6. Released after having spent sixteen years in Parramatta Gaol on a life sentence, ‘‘Praying Dick” —his real identity lost in the past—set out for his native land by a London-bound mail boat this week. On the wharf, waving good J bye to him, stood the man whom he had shot in 1913 and for whose wounding he had been sent to gaol. ‘•Praying Dick’s” departure marked the climax of an unusual series of incidents which have lasted for five years. During that time the victim of “Praying Dick” has been untiring in his efforts to secure for his attacker, who shot Jiim dow-n and left him to die in 1913, release from the hands of the law. Petty theft —a lady’s handbag—was responsible for the sensational shooting affray that sent “Praying Dick” to gaol. He had been sleeping in the Sydney Domain and was walking towards the city when he was passed by a man and two ladies. Tempted suddenly he snatched a handbag from one of the girls and was making , his escape when the man, their companion, closed with him. Dick, according to the story he told at the trial, drew his revolver, which he insisted he had bought for protection while sleeping-out in the Domain, and fired- several shots, one of which struck the other man in the body. As his victim fell unconscious, Dick darted away, but the shots had been heard and a passer-by was close on his heels. They came to grips and in desperation Dick fired again, also wounding the second man. The police were by this time in the vicinity and Dick was trapped in a lane from which he had no escape. He surrendered quietly and a few weeks later was sentenced to life imprisonment. The man who was shot first hovered between life and death for three weeks before he took a turn for the better, and recovered. His evidence against Dick at the trial was the trump cardof the Crown case. Dick was sent to Parramatta gaol and he has been there for sixteen years. When ho entered the gaol he was eighteen years of age. To-day he is thirty-five, though he looks nearer fifty. The reformation of “Praying Dick” did not come immediately. For a time his soul was embittered, but little by little he became resigned to the monotonous routine of prison life. It was then that he yielded to the efforts of prison reformers whose kindly interest and sympathy soon won Dick over to a Christian outlook on life.

Now he has gone off tb England to make a new start. His family have bought a thriving ‘business in a country. town and there Dick will work out his salvation, only made possible by the efforts of the very • man whom he had shot down sixteen years ago, and for the wounding of whom he went to gaol.