DUPED BY FOREIGN WOMAN.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1687, 1 March 1913, Page 12

DUPED BY FOREIGN WOMAN.

NAVAL SECRETS CASE.

SENTENCE OF FOUR YEARS;

JUDGE'S OFFER TO GUNNER AT OLD

BAILEY,

A verdict of guilty, and a sentence of four years' penal servitude, terminated the naval secrets case at the Old Bailey on January IG. Tho prisoner was Georgo Herbert Parrott, 45, formerly a gunner in tho Navy, and ho was charged with communicating information concerning tho Navy which might bo prejudioial to tho saiety and interest of the State, or might be of use to an enemy.

The woman in the caso was referred to by Mr. Justice Darling in passing sentence. "I do not know Whether you know," said the judge, "that you aro liable to seven years' penal servitude. I shall not givo yau, the full sentence, although I am not euro that you don't deservo it. You have been long under suspicion, and I do not suppose for a moment that this was the first offence.

"I think this, however, that you were probably entrapped. Those who want to get information are well supplied with money, and they aro ingenious in their means of getting tho information they desire. I beliovo you were entrapped by a woman who is an agent of somp foreign country, and that you were ingeniously entrapped and you fell. Because I believe that, I am going to show some sort of leniently for you, but it cannot the crime is too great. "If you desire to havo this sentence reduced, any part of it remitted, let mo adviso yon to tell the authorities all you know, and enable them to trace out the 60urce from which the danger to this country comes. Make that much retribution for your country, and as far as I can do so I will use any influence I may have in procuring some remission of your sentenoe." A Russian's Banknote. The only witness called on January 16 was a reception clerk from the Savoy Hotel, who said that on April 26 last a Kussian named Helak-Dadaeif, who had been staying at the hotel for a few days, left for the Continent. Evidence had been given on the preceding day to the'effect that, a J220 note paid by the prisoner into his own account was paid out to this Kussian from the Bank of England. Addressing the jury for the defence, Mr. J. D. Cassels urged that the ease was one of suspicion, and suspicion only. The suggestion of the prosecution was that prisoner communicated naval secrets to representatives of sorno foreign country, but the only knowledge the man could ' have had was that which was found in tho ordinary publication concerning battleships. Dealing with the ,£2O Bank of England note, tho receipt of which the prisoner could not satisfactorily explain during his cross-examination, Mr. Cassels said the question was sprung upon Parrott for the first time at the end of a trying ordeal. Tho Judgo: Is thero no explanation now where it came from—no further information? Counsel: No, my lord. We knew nothing of it until the cross-examination of yesterday. Tho Judge: The .night has passed. If he has been able to think of anything during that time he shall have the opportunity of stating it now. Counsel: There is no other explanation, my lord. A Dupe and a Tool. Mr. Cassels continued that tho defence was that this unfortunate man had been the dupo and tho tool of designing people acting upon somebody else's behalf; that ho was a man who hnd been made the tool of people who thought that at some time ot other they might havo been able to worm out of him somo information lrtilch might have been useful to an enemy. Tho bait which was set to catch the

man was a Lait which had not infrequently been set to catch a njan—tho bait of a woman. At the start of I all this business somo women, with another objcct in vieiv, met this man in a music-hall and got into touch with him, in, order, at somo time or other, to bo able 1 to pass him 011 to tho oilier workers in the 6py cause to mako liirn a victim of these circumstanccs,

Replying for the Croivn, 'Sir John Simon remarked that, with the exception of two documents whiclu were siiized by tho police, every scrap of paper received by l'arrott from tho foreigners had been destroyed. • It was also a curious fact, snid counsel, that the Belgian address given in the witness-box by the prisoner was no address at all. It was simply tho name of a street. \ "Tlio Crown does not adcuso him of being a spy," said Sir John' Simon. "A spy breaks no oath of allegiance, a spy does not act contrary to the duty which he owes to his King and his' country, a spy plays a game of courage and of craft, and he pays tho penalty.' "Tho accusation in this case is not that,_ The accusation is—and lam glad to think it is one almost without parallel in our annals—that a man who is mi Englishman, a British subject, and who was in the Novy in the honourable rank of an officer, has fallen bo low that for money ho has sold tho confidence, of his country to one of those wretched inquiry agents who, I boliove, servo no' useful purpose to any country." Judge and the Government. In his summing up, Mr. Justice Darling referred to precautions taken bj governments* to prevent the leakage of confidential information. "Our Government, perhaps," 110 said, "are late in the day, because wo are never, as a nation, to niy thinking, es intelligent on euch matters as otlior nations, nor aot so soon. Our Government by August, 19X1, had como to tlVs conclusion that the law wanted strengthening in this respect, and you may depend on it they did not como to that conclusion lightly." The Navy of this country was our finest servioe. Its memories went back far into tho past, and practioally its record was unstained. Tho very names that had been mentioned in that cn=e—the names of places visited in tho North Sea —must bring back tho memory of Nelson and tho renown of tho Naw 'of his day. It was a sad thing to think that any Englishman should have fallen into such a position as that occupied by the defendant.

Major-General E. C. Betheune, Direc-tor-General of the-Territorial Force, in distributing prizes to the Gtli City of London liifies, said he had got into trouble through calling men who played golf all day "lazy hounds"; but he 6tuck to it. If we were invaded to-morrow the enemy would not challenge us to play golf or football, but a very different game. Why could not people bo as proud of their local Territorial Corps a 9 of tho local football team? An ex-Mayor and alderman of Macclesfield, who came up to a constable who was questioning some small boys carrying firtree tops home for Christmas and told him not to frighten tho lads, whom ho advised to run off home, was fined 40s. and costs for obstructing tho police. ■ At an inquest on a sidesman, aged eighty-three, of tho Parish Church at Prees, Shropshire, who died while collecting the offertory, it was stated that the deceased had not required a doctor for seventy years, and attributed his excellent health to drinking rain-water. An American millionaire, at a 6alo of his pictures in New York, 6aid to a reporter: "Yes, these are all good things, things collected, with great care. You can't comment on them as the teacher once commented on the pupil's drawing. " 'I draw what I see,' the,pupil said complacently. " 'Well, the shock will come,' the teacher answered, 'when you see what you have dr?.<vn.'" Dr. Woodrow Wilson, President-elect ot tho United States, has announced that when lie assumes office he will not be available for hand-shaking with miscellaneous callers at the White House. At tho beginning of Mr. Taffs administration a great deal of irritation was caused by; tlw : President''having to lfavti important business for "hand-shaking receptions."