JOHN J. MEIKLE HAS FOUGHT FOR JUSTICE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18939, 9 December 1929, Page 9

JOHN J. MEIKLE HAS FOUGHT FOR JUSTICE.

URGES GOVERNMENT TO DO RIGHT THING. (Special to the “Star.”) AUCKLAND, December 9. “I’m getting nearer the grave and it is up to the Government to do the right thing,” said John J. Meikle, of Salisbury Road, Mount Albert, when he received a letter from the Minister of Justice stating that Cabinet had decided to take no action following a recommendation by the Public Petitions Committee that he should be granted a pension of £4 weekly for the rest of his life. Mr Me'ikle is now 87 years of age, and his case is well known. In 1887 he was sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment on a charge of sheep stealing at Mataura. On his release he took the public platform throughout New Zealand to proclaim his innocence, and for many years the matter has been before Parliament. In 1910 he was made a public grant of £2500, and for the past seven years public petitions committees have made favourable recommendations for the pension. “I have spent over £6OOO of my own money in fighting for justice,” said the old man. “Now I am penniless. All I have now is the old age pension, and if it were not for two of my girls helping me I would be in the old men’s home.” Mr Meikle was imprisoned at the Invercargill, Lyttelton, Wellington, and Nelson gaols. He was 44 when committed. He has been married twice and had 22 children. Fifteen of them are still living. He has 65 grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.