WANGANUI MURDERER

Hokitika Guardian, 3 September 1930, Page 4

WANGANUI MURDERER

:i REASON OF REPRIEVE. _ 1 (By Telegraph—Per Press Association^

WELLINGTON, -Sept. 2. f c- The statement that, although Herbert Francis Manley, who was con- ' victed of the murder of Gladys Cromarty, in Wanganui, and was sentenced to death, he could not proper-' ly have been regarded as insane from the legal standpoint, was made by the Minister of Justice, Hon. : J. G;' Cobbe, in the House to-day, in reply to an urgent question. 1 r 1 v 'Mr Cobbe said, however, that Man- ■ ley’te mental condition,- and the antecedent circumstances, were deemed tobe mitigating factors which ’ justified 1; the commutation of the sentence. Mr R. A. Wright (Wellington Suburbs) asked the Minister “if he "would inform the House why it was that Manley had had his death sentence commuted to imprisonment for life. ; ’ The Minister repied that, in recommending the Governor-General to , commute the sentence to imprison.ment for life, the Executive Council . ..took into consideration the whole of the surrounding circumstances of the case, the history of Manley’s life, and reports from mental experts regarding Manley’s mental condition.