SENTENCE REDUCED

Timaru Herald, Volume CXL, Issue 20282, 4 December 1935, Page 13

SENTENCE REDUCED

JUDGE’S COMMENT ON REFORMATIVE TREATMENT Bv Telegraph—Prese Association CHRISTCHURCH, December 3. Interesting observations on the application of sentences of reformative detention were made by Mr Justice Northcroft in a reserved judgment, dealing with an application for a review of a sentence imposed in Nelson by Mr Maunsell, S.M., on a prisoner who had been convicted of stealing money he had received on behalf of the Nelson Relief Workers' Social Committee. In reducing the sentence imposed on Sidney George Hall, from two years’ reformative detention to six months detention, his Honor stated that the power to order detention in excess of the prescribed maximum periods ol imprisonment should be employed only in exceptional circumstances, and where there was the strongest reason to anticipate beneficial results for the offender. In his judgment, the present case did not reveal those exceptional prospects of rehabilitation, which alone would justify a sentence in excess of the statutory maximum. “In my opinion reformative detention should not be resorted to for the imposition of a longer term of imprisonment than prescribed as the maximum, because the offence is a bad one, nor because the offender has a had record,” said the Judge. “In my judgment this present case does not reveal those exceptional prospects of rehabilitation, which alone would justify a sentence in excess of the statutory maximum. For these reasons, I consider an appropriate sentence should have been one of imprisonment with hard labour for six months. Section 5 of the Crimes Amendment Act provides that every person sentenced by a Magistrate to a period of reformative detention may apply, ex parte, to a judge of the Supreme Court to review that sentence, and such Judge may thereupon either uphold or reverse the sentence or reduce the term. I entertain doubts as to whether this is an authority for the setting aside of such sentence of reformative detention, and for its replacement by a sentence of imprisonment with hard labour. In these circumstances I will make an order for the reduction of the sentence of two years’ reformative detention to one of reformative detention for a period of six