LOCAL AND GENERAL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 May 1941, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL

Serious Crime, Regret that in the list comprising nineteen bills of indictment there was an unusually large proportion of serious crime was expressed by Mr Justice Fair in his charge to the grand jury at the opening of the criminal sessions of the Supreme Court in Auckland. Five were charges of negligently driving motor vehicles, in .four cases so as to cause death and in the fifth so as to cause serious injury. There were no fewer than ten bills charging persons with committing sexual offences. The I other cases were two alleged cases of 'pocket-picking in hotel bars, one of obItaining money by false pretences and one theft of a heifer.

Swept Overboard. Albert Lowe, aged 25. able seaman in a New Zealand cargo vessel, was swept overboard by a ■ heavy sea recently shortly after the vessel left an Australian port. Lowe, a single man, whose parents live at Hawera. was lashing down deck fittings when a sea swept across the vessel, carrying him overboard. Though an emergency boat was ready to lower a minute.and a half after the alarm was given, it was deemed impossible for the boat to live in the big sea running and the attempt at rescue had to be abandoned. The storm was described by those aboard the vessel as the worst even encountered. Deel: cargo was lost overboard and some damage was done to cargo in the holds.