FALSE DECLARATION

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 2305, 21 July 1921, Page 2

FALSE DECLARATION

Auckland, Last Night

A Dalmatian, Jure Castanich, was fined £4O for making a false declaration to secure naturalisation as a British -abject. The Crown Prosecutor said that the man declared he had resided in the Dominion six years,Whereas he had been only one or two months, and could not speak English, and did not realise the seriousness of the offence. - The Justice of the Peace before whom the declaration had been made was a storekeeper. His Honour said he thought probably that: Justices w'ere a great deal too casual, and failed to impress the fact that a solemn declaration was being made. The prosecutor said there was reason for believing that the offence was not an isolated one. The question was raised of what action should be taken in regard to the Justice under consideration. His Honour, in imposing the fine, took into consideration the fact that the prisoner had recently arrived from ex-Austria, and he found that the Justice had been perfectly really and willing to make himself a party to the fraud, and had signed and transmitted to the Department for the prisoner’s benefit, the declaration that he had known the prisoner for five years. The authorities, doubtless, would take what action they thought fit in regard to the Justice.