PRISONERS TO PAY THE PENALTY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17698, 19 November 1925, Page 7

PRISONERS TO PAY THE PENALTY.

SENTENCES IMPOSED IN SUPREME COURT. Several prisoners came up for sentence before Mr Justice Adams to-day. No Safety Valve. Ernest Astrup Guillermo, seventeen years of age, had p.eaded guilty to theft from the premises of P. C. Wilberg. Mastic, Bull and Pickering,.. Whitcombo and Tombs, the Barnet Glass Rubber Company and Armstrong and Farr. The goods he stoic were valued at bout £153. Mr Hunter said that Guillermo's parents were very respectable people. Until recently, his growth, physically and mentally, had been retarded. Ho had bad two operations, one of which had caused him to stutter, a defect that kept him apart from other youths. Ho seemed to have got on to a. wrong line of thought, aud the offences were the result. He belonged to the Rev •T. F. Courser's church x and to the St John's Young Men’s Club, and Mr Coursev had promised to co-operate with the probation officer in respect to him, if lie was admitted to probation. Mr Coursev said that Guillermo’s development had been retarded, hut he had sprung very suddenI.* 1 .* from boyhood into manhood. He, apparently, had had no safety-valve with which to get rid of the explosive energy that came with youth at certain times. Tie had no vent for the spirit of adventure in all youths. He was the youngest member of the Young Men’s Club. The other members were willing io take part in helping him. His parents were most estimable people. If they had erred at all, it was in shutting the hoy out of activities and keeping him away from associates. His Honor said that Guillermo had been before the Juvenile Court for theft. He now had pleaded guilty absolutely to three charges and guilty in respect to part of two charges. Breaking and entering and crimes of that nature were becoming too common for the safety of the community. Guillermo would be detained for reformative treatment for a period not ex- | (-ceding four years. Probation Granted. ‘ William Alexander Findlay, forty-

t hree years of age. came up for having stolen goods valued at £32 from the shop of John If. Andrews, Rictarton. " Mr Thomas said that Findlay was a bricklayer, and was a hard worker and an expert. He had been working at night at a baker's oven immediately before he stole the goods. His Honor said that the fact that a man had been working at night at a baker’s oyen hardly justified his breaking into a shop and stealing goods worth £32. It was somewhat farfetched. Mr Thomas said that Findlay was ill at- the time. On the top of his exhaustion, he took some liquor and then committed the offence. He then went into the park with his revolver and shot iryto trees. lie -told* another man that he saw women in the tree-tops and was shooting them. His wife was an invalid, and he was a good husband. Mr Brown, for the Crown Prosecutor, said that Findlay was tinder the influence of liquor when he committed the crime. His Honor said that Findlay was entitled to the benefits of probation. Since 1599, when he* was in trouble, Jje had led a good and decent life. It was clear that his present crime was committed under th* influence of drink. He would be admitted to probation for two years, on condition that he took out. a prohibition order against himself and paid £5 4s, costs of the prosecution. and £4, costs of thp stolen goods not returned. Postal Officer’s Offence. Cecil Claude Austen Bernard's offeree was th«ft of a postal-note for, 10s as/a postal officer. Mr Twyneham said that Bernard was employed at Parnassus when he stole the note. He was seventeen years of lage. lie had been in the Christchurch Post Office for two years, also latterly in the Railway Department. Ilis report from the Technical College was excellent. He said that he saw the note through a tear in the envelope in which it was sent, and he yielded to a sudden ..temptation, lie had lost his position in the railways, but was cmploA'ed in a grocery business. Bernard was remanded until November 27 for a report from the Probation Officer. He was admitted to bail. Remanded. David Swift, seventeen years of Age, who broke into the dwellings of Mrs H. A. Alexandre, Marshland, Ma Lik Ming, Riccarton, and Yee Long, Richmond, 'and stole goods, was remanded for a report from the Probation Officer.