LIFETIME IN GAOL.

Hokitika Guardian, 16 January 1923, Page 1

LIFETIME IN GAOL.

OCTOGENA RI AN (THAI IXAL’S DEATH. . SYDNEY, Jan. 3. A career of crime commenced at the age of 14, a lifetime in gaols all over the world, and death at 82 in the degradation of prison, was the remark* aide career of John Dawson, who has just, died nL the Yatala Stockade, near Adelaide. Dawson had spent nearly the whole of his lifetime in gaols in different parts of the world. An incurable offender, lie was no sooner free from one prison than his footsteps led him - via some misdeed—into another. Crime to him became a piol'essioii. His remarkable record showed that the terms of imprisonment imposed upon him aggregated more than the number of years that he has been alive. Dawson was born in England in IS ID. Ai tin- age of 11 lie began bis criminal career by commiling a theft at Hull. Six years later, he was sentenced to 20 years’ penal servitinle for robbery with violence. That term having been served, he turned his attention to other countries. 11 is trail fed by devious routes half across the world to Western Australia, where ia 18S5 in was imprisoned for seven ear.-* lor larceny and receiving. In 1911, in the same State, lie was sen- ) -need to six months for larceiiv. Since then Here have been 02 otlikr i-invidious again'.: Pie-. including a Urge number in Sydney and Victoria. ; along others for laiii .T-suult an !

breaking gaol. In 1913 he was sent to gaol ior unlawful possession anil lar- . ceii.y in South Australia, and was ordered two months’ imprisonment on each charge. j Dawson by this time was an old I man. and his hand had lost much of its cunning. He had the English trait of tenacity in his ways of crime. Scorning the shelter and food which he could have received for the rest ol ' his life at .an institution for the aged and helpless, he pursued his nefarious trade, made desperate, apparently .b\ the thought of increasing feebleness and declining years. He was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment for attempted pocket-picking. Probably on account of his ago, however, lie was freed before the expiration of that period. A few days after his liberation lie smithed a purse from a basket carried by a young girl. The sentence oil that occasion of twelve months was the final one for the sad old vagabond, lie returned to the Stockade that day and never again saw the world beyond tin' prison walls.