A SOCIAL MENACE

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3146, 26 July 1917, Page 6

A SOCIAL MENACE

—: —♦ ~ PKOCUfiER SENTENCED TO IMPRISONMENT. By Telegraph.—Press Association. Dunedin, July 25. Ernest Sylvester Phillip Ebzers pleaded guilty in the Police Court this morning to a charge of keeping a housa of ill-fame at North-east Harbour. TheMagistrate, Mr. Young, before the facte were stated, prdertd the crowded Court, to lie cleared. Chief-Detective Bishop said tint the. evidence gathered by the detectives revealed shocking facts, proving that not only was the accused a brothel-keeper . of the worst tvpe, but he was a procurer ' of girls. One was a mere girl of seventeen, and another was a wile,, whose husband was now fightiufe in Eralice. With the exception of these, two, all the girls concerning whom the police had evidence of their being at the house, were in respectable situations. One was formerly in .accused's employ, and he obtained an evil influence over her, and she assisted him to procure fresh girls from among her working companions. , ' , The Magistrate said that the accused, was liable to twelve months' imprison- . ment, but as under the Military Service Act a man who served that term ceased, to become a reservist, accused would bo sentenced to eleven months'; imprisonment with hard labour. The Magis- . trate considered that a suggestion that a fine would be sufficient was out ot the question.