PALMESSTON GAOL

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2171, 9 June 1914, Page 6

PALMESSTON GAOL

PROTEST AGAINST ITS REMOVAL. ( Protest against a rccont- dw.iiioa of the Prisons Department was made by a Palmerston North deputatioa whioh was introduced to tho jjon. A, L. Hordiaau (Minister of Justice) yesterday by Mr. D. Buick, M.P. Xhs raeiiibeK •>£ thedeputation wero Sir. J. A. Nash (Mayor of Palmerston North) and Coaiiciilor Anderson. , Mr. Nash presented a petition, signed by over ono hundred residents, praying tho Government to abandon its intention of using the Police Gaol at Painioiston oiily for the reception of prisoners undergoing detention for a wees; or less. These lines occur in the petition: "In the interests- of the Dominion as a- wh-ole and in the interesis ef this district in particular, and for the economical and eiDcient administration of justice, it is absolutely .necessary that the ga©l should bo retained." Tho decision of the Just,ice Department to which the petition refers is that prisoners sentenced at Pal-raerstou. North to more than a weojs's (imprisonment shall be transferred from the Police Gaol in that town to Wanganui, whero there is a -sscottd-clasg jifisoa at present not very much used. Mr. Nash stated that it was .felt- by the- people of Palmerston that the effect of transferring prisoners to Wangaivui would he to lessen tho amount <sf Supremo Co-tttt work at Palmerston North, Ho submitted that prisoners committed for sentence would be placed at a disadvantage if they were transferred to Wanganui, in that they wouid net bo able to consult cttlmsel. The Minister, iti reply, said that he had gone carefully into the whofe. matter with his Departmental officers' and felt that ho could not altar hi-fi decision. There was a growing feeling, he said, that the gaols should n«t fo in cities and largo towns, and the policy of tho Prisons Dopartoont was to transfer tho gaols to country sites- in isolated but reasonably accessible localities.