$2000 reparation ordered

Press, 12 February 1986, Page 4

$2000 reparation ordered

Community service in respect of a woman convicted of stealing almost $12,000 from her employer over a period of 12 months was not an appropriate sentence, said Judge Sheehan in the District Court yesterday.

Sandra Mary Chinnery,

aged 24, unemployed (Mr P. B. McMenamin), was sentenced to periodic detention for seven months.

She was ordered to pay $2OOO reparation. The Judge said the former employer had the right to civil redress for the balance. The thefts had been systematic and calculated. Before the new Criminal Justice Act’s coming into force, a prison sentence would have been imposed as a matter of course, said the Judge. Mr McMenamin said the dimensions of the substantial offending had given his client a very substantial shock. Chinnery began her offending by covering a discrepancy, not of her own making, when she returned from holiday. Things had just snowballed from then on. The money had not been spent on any apparent vice, high living, or the accumulation of

assets. "She was simply supporting an ordinary standard of living,” said Mr McMenamin. The defendant had paid $llOO into her trust account towards the payment of reparation, he said. RECEIVING CHARGE Bail was opposed by the police for an Australian, a prohibited immigrant, who faces a charge of receiving. Paul Williams, aged 35, a fitter, was remanded in custody to February 18. He did not plead to a charge of receiving a camera and lens, a watch, and a cassette player, valued at $l9lO. In opposing bail, Sergeant W. J. McCormick said the receiving charge was tied in with a major Auckland burglary. Williams, he said, was a prohibited immigrant. He was deported to Australia on December 4 and was back in New Zealand a few days later.