DEATH OF CHILD.

Waikato Times, Volume 117, Issue 19565, 2 May 1935, Page 11

DEATH OF CHILD.

MALNUTRITION ALLEGED. FOSTER-PARJENT CHARGED. FINE OF £2 IMPOSED. (By Telegraph.—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, Wednesday. On February 5, a Maori child, Huia Leahy, aged four months, died at Packakariki and at the subsequent inquest a verdict was returned that death was due to exhaustion, following malnutrition. To-day in the Magistrate’s Court, the child’s foster-parent, Mironia Util Budge pleaded guilty to a charge of retaining the child for the purpose of nursing it, apart from its parents for more than seven days, not being licensed as a foster-parent.

It was suggested that the child got into the condition it was in, owing to defendant going to work and leaving some of her daughters to look after it. The magistrate, Mr J. 11. Luxford, S.M., remarked that though the provisions of the Act were apparently not very well known, they were very important and very far reaching and many people might unwittingly commit a breach of them. The heavy penalties provided, however, showed that the legislation regarded the matter as one of importance. Had there been wilful neglect there was a proper provision in the criminal law which would render a defendant liable to indictment. In all the circumstances of the case he did not propose to inflict a heavy penalty. A fine of £2 was imposed.