SOLDIERS’ OFFENCES

Waikato Times, Volume 131, Issue 21910, 14 December 1942, Page 2

SOLDIERS’ OFFENCES

MILITARY TRIAL SUGGESTED WELLINGTON, Saturday The comment that the military authorities should deal with such cases themselves so as to avoid the entering of a criminal conviction | was made by Mr J. L. Stout, S.M., yesterday, when a young soldier pleaded guilty of attempting to steal two gallons of petrol, the property of the New Zealand Army Department. It was stated that defendant had been caught attempting to obtain some petrol from an Army truck. He had driven some friends in a rental car to the camp where they were stationed, and had run short of 1 petrol. He had no previous convictions. The magistrate said that he had previously suggested that the military authorities should themselves deal with such cases as that before the court. Young soldiers came before him, and if they were convicted the conviction was placed on the police records, and was a mark against them for all time. “The whole trouble seems to be,” said the magistrate, “that if the Army tries these cases it has to be done by court-martial, a very involved procedure and quite unnecessary in these minor cases.” Regulations allowing a senior officer to deal with the offenders should be made. Remarking that defendant had not obtained the petrol, the magistrate dismissed the charge as trivial.