CHILD ABANDONED.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 368, 9 March 1932, Page 12

CHILD ABANDONED.

Girl Sentenced by Judge at Wellington. TWO YEARS IN BORSTAL. (Special to the “ Star.’’) WELLINGTON, Alarch 8. The opinion that the offence would have to be expiated and that it was a mistake that the girl should marry into the Mongolian race Avas expressed in the Supreme Court by Mr Justice Ostler to-day, when Ivy Thelma Leigh, aged twenty-two years, appeared for sentence on a charge of abandoning her infant child on the porch of the St Barnabas Home, Khandallah, last month.

The paternity of the child, said the girl’s counsel, was readily admitted by a Chinese, who Avas ready to marry her, and the girl herself Avas agreeable tq that course.

Counsel referred to the report of the probation officer, in which it Avas suggested that it would be in the best interests of accused if she were kept away from the Chinese. Counsel urged that it was a question for his Honor to decide. If his Honor thought the girl should be kept aAvay, he suggested that she should be placed on probation, with the condition that she did not cohabit with the father of the child. His Honor took the view that it Avas not in the best interests of the child or of the girl herself to go free. The offence Avould have to be expiated. After that the girl would be free to act as she chose. He imposed a sentence of two years’ Borstal detention.