OFFENCE OUSTS £l288

Taranaki Daily News, 24 July 1931, Page 9

OFFENCE OUSTS £l288

IMPORTATIONS OF SILVER WOMAN TRANSFERS HER WEALTH FEAR OF LOSSES IN AUSTRALIA.

OFFICERS OF THE SHIP INVOLVED.

By Telegraph.—Press Association

Auckland, July 23.

Fines totalling £125, costs £6 6s and the forfeiture of £1157, was the. penalty inflicted on Irene. Dobson, aged 35, today for importing Australian silver coins.

The Crown Prosecutor said that accused had made a series of trips from Sydney under various names. On May 17 she landed at Wellington with £O5O in silver. This was seized, but she explained that it was her own money which she was transferring to New Zealand. The explanation was accepted and after a warning she was allowed to take the silver, back. to Australia. In July she brought over £l4OO, which two of the ship’s officers took to her in an hotel in Auckland after the arrival of the Maraprn. These two men had been fined in Wellington and the police seized £989 in the. hotel. The total imported was £l4OO. The ofTence was committed deliberately after a warning. Accused’s counsel pleaded that, like many others in Australia, accused was terrified of the possibility of losing all she had in Australia and that apprehension was reasonable. She had paid the ship’s officers’ fines. The Crown Prosecutor said that the court must deal with the ofTence and make the punishment sufficiently deterrent. Counsel’s proper course was to apply to the Minister of Customs. William Bennett McGre or, aged 52, millhand, was fined £25 for being in possession of Australian silver. He was described as a tool of Dobson in getting the silver changed.

NEW LIMITS UPON SILVER.

NO ONE TO ENTER WITH OVER £2

Wellington, Last Night.

Under the new regulations relating to the importation and export of silver coin, which are gazetted to-night, persons coming into the Dominion are limited to silver coin to the value of £2, while those leaving New Zealand will be permitted to take not more than £5 in silver coin. An exception is made in the ease of travellers proceeding to Britain or Ireland by a direct route without transhipment, when £lO is the limit, except where permission is granted by the Minister to increase these amounts.

The regulations will not apply to coined silver, whether legal tender or not, which is more than 100 years old.