MAORI’S PETROL RAMP

Evening Star, Issue 24324, 13 October 1942, Page 4

MAORI’S PETROL RAMP

896 GALLONS MISUSED (L’.A.) NAPIER, October 12. ” To my mind it is a case of sabotage,” commented the magistrate (Mr J. Miller) in the Napier Court to-day, when convicting a Native. Whui Carroll, a married man, with 12 children, on three charges of obtaining oil fuel otherwise than for the purposes set out in the applications he had made to the Oil Fuel Controller. Carroll was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment on the first two charges, the terms to bo cumulative, and was fined £3O on the third charge. The defendant pleaded guilty. Detective-sergeant K. Mills said that between January 5 and June 30 Carroll drew no less than Oil gallons'of petrol to cut and haul firewood, and on his own admission the total quantity used for this purpose was only 15 gallons. On his own estimate, therefore, he had misused 806 gallons since the beginning of the year. The accused had admitted giving some of the petrol to throe other men. During December, 1011 7 Carroll became ill, and from then on did not cut any firewood. The defendant was' charged with offences which had been committed this year, Detective-sergeant Mills said, but the evidence had disclosed that offences had been taking place over a longer period. The time limit for laying informations, however, had expired. Carroll had written to the controller asking that his license be increased to 352 gallons a month. At that time he was receiving 176 gallons a month. When arrested the defendant had confessed that he had used much of the petrol for his own running about, and had given away some 250 gallons. Carroll on April 16 was granted a disability pension of £l-10 a year for total disability, Detective-sergeant Mills added. During the period AprilJnne he drew 52S gallons of petrol, allegedly to out and haul firewood, and yet he was in receipt of a pension for total disability, having been certified as unfit for any manual work. Mr IC. V. Simpson, counsel for the defendant, after dealing with the communal ways of the Maoris, said that Carroll was uneducated, and had no real sense of figures. He had no lorry of his own, and borrowed vehicles from relatives. The defendant did not see anything wrong in giving petrol to the men from whom he borrowed the lorries. Mr Simpson said he could not understand the controller’s granting petrol to a Maori who was not in business, and who had no vehicles of his own. Carroll had been lulled into a sense of security by the ease with which he obtained the petrol. The Magistrate said that the fact that a Native had obtained large quantities of petrol to be frittered away was a matter for the authorities to investigate, and, if necessary, the regulations should he tightened up. Subsequently, three Natives—Korc Tunua, of Feruhill, 'Broughton David Edwards, of ©ridge Pa, and Dudley Cyril August, of Waimarama—were charged rvith breaches of the Oil Fuel Regulations. Detective-sergeant Mills said the defendants had loaned their trucks _to Carroll and had obtained petrol in return. Tunua was fined £lO, and August and Edwards £2O cadi.