Set Jamboree Tent Alight

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30955, 11 January 1966, Page 3

Set Jamboree Tent Alight

(New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, January 10. A youth who set fire to a tent at the Scout Progress Jamboree at Trentham Memorial Park because he had “nothing better to do” appeared before Mr J. F. Keane, S.M., in the Lower Hutt Magistrate’s Court today on a charge of wilfully setting fire to a tent, the property of the New Plymouth-North Taranaki scout contingent.

Dennis John Crook, aged 17, unemployed, was remanded to January 18 for a probation officer’s report and sentence. Bail was set at £lOO in his own recognisance with one surety of £lOO. He was ordered to report daily to the Lower Hutt police station. Detective-Sergeant D. J. Dwan said that at 12.45 a.m. on January 8 flames were seen coming from a tent in the Pickering site at the jamboree.

The tent was the dining shelter of the New PlymouthNorth Taranaki contingent. The Fire Brigade was called, but the scouts had ex-

tinguished the fire before the brigade arrived. The tent was destroyed and bags and items of clothing badly damaged. The damage was estimated at £l5, Mr Dwan said. Investigations made by the police showed petrol had been used. It had apparently been thrown from seven to 10 feet away. Accused was interviewed and admitted being partly responsible for the offence, Mr Dwan said. In explanation Crook had said they had “nothing else better to do.”