"FREE FROM CRIME."

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 796, 20 April 1910, Page 6

"FREE FROM CRIME."

AN INTERESTING DISCLOSURE. OVEBTUIffiS TO A PBISONEB. ' "■ ■! ' Many. people are disposed at limas to look with pride upon the police statistics of New Zealand, as showing how comparatively free this country is from crime. If a case which happened ito ba mentioned at the meeting of the Dis-. charged Prisoners' Aid Society yesterday, is typical of others, it suggests a partial explanation of this satisfactory, crime-sheet which does not reflect too pleasantly upon the dignity or the altruism of the Department. It was stated, in the secretary's report, read at the meeting of the society yesterday, that the assistance of the society .had been sought by private .philanthropists, . magistrates in other parts of the Dominion, "also by the Secretary of the Minister for Justice, invoking your aid to so place a very dangerous criminal that he would be no more trouble to our Dominion." This last point was slightly expanded in a later reference in the report, which was as follows:—"Very special assistance was asked by Mr. Wnldegrave to take and get out of the colony a man gaol, he being a very dangerous : criminal. It appears from inquiry, that two obstacles presented themselves to thia design. In the first place, the secretary ,of the society wished very naturally to know to what, extent the Department would assist in providing the wherewithal-for the man's departure from the Dominion if he - was agreeable to go, and this information, it is understood, has not yet been given. In the ■second place, the man himself, on being released from gaol, was not in any hurry to take a distant journey, to suggestions that an early removal from these shores might be to his advantage he replied that ho was not eager to go abroad- at once. He would' like to take a trip to Auckland, there were reasons which made Christchurch attractive to him foi a time, and he would like to have a look at Dunedin. Being a free agent, he is still at large in the Dominion. The secretary of the society stated, that another ex-prisoner had well-to-do relatives in the Old Country, who sent out £20 to assist him to transfer his presence to another part of the world. He utilised the money to take him back to England:- .