SUPREME COURT.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VII, Issue 198, 20 August 1872, Page 2

SUPREME COURT.

CRIMINAL SITTINGS. [Before hiß Honor Mr Justice Richmond]. Larceny x-kom a. Whabf. Ernest Schwass, for stealing a saddle from the wharf at "Waitapu, was sentenced to six months imprisonment with hard labor. PEBJCBT4 William Paap, who was yesterday found guilty ! of perjury, was this morning brought up for sentence, in passing which his Honor said that he had reason to believe from his own experience, and from what he had heard from the other Judges, that the crime of perj ury was largely on the increise in the inferior courts. It was h'gh time that a stop was put to this growing crime, and he should always mark his sense of the gravity of the offence by awarding a severe punishment in all cases that were brought before him. The present was a most deliberate and palpable case of perjury, and the prisoner would be sentenced to twelve months' imprisonment with hard labor. FRAUDULENT BANKRUPTCY. Jeremiah Sheehy was charged with wilfully and fraudently making a false statement of his effects on filing his schedule at Charleston, he having declared that he had only property to the amounc of £11, whereas he was possessed of assets amounting to more than £150, in addition to which he had obtained a quantity of goods on credit immediately prior to declaring himself bankrupt. Mr. H. Adams appeared for the prosecution, and Mr. Fell for the prisoner. Ernest Charles Killing, clerk of the Dis'rict Court of Westland .North, said : I know the prisoner, who was a miner at Charleston. He filed a declaration of insolvency on the 6th June last, which I produce, together with the verified list of cj editors and statement of assets and liabilities. On the 27th June he was adjudicated a bankrupt. He was at that time examined as to his affairs, and handed in the list produced, which he said represented the whole of his property. J. B. Fisher : I am a solicitor practising at Westport. The lists produced were signed, and the affidavits made, before me. Cross-examined : I drew up the lists under instructions from the prisoner. I asked the prisoner at the time if he had any more property, and he said, No. I don't recollect his saying anything about having some drapery, and my telling him that would go down as furniture. I asked him when the debts were contracted, and on his telling me that some of them were contracte i a short time previously, I warned him that he would have to be careful. Solomon Ellis: I am bailiff of the District Court at Charleston. I remember prisoner being adjudicated a bankrupt. He was examined upon oacli as to his property. He said, in reply to a question from Judge Harvey, that his schedule contained a correct statement of his assets, which, if anything, were rather over-estimated. The Judge, after examining him at some length, told him to stand down, and he would file a criminal information against him. On being examined by one of the creditors, he said that he had nothing more than was in his schedule, except a part of a quarter-chest of tea, part of a bag of flour, and a very small portion of butter. I alterwards ■went to his house and seized two quarter-chests, and part of a quarter-chest of tea, two bags, and a part of a bag of flour, half a cask of butter, a full box of cocoa, 251bs of currants and raisins, a full bag of sugar, and about 40lbs in another bag, a quantity of new drapery to the value of £26 10s, including two French dresses, a quantity of flannel, two or three pieces of plaid for children's dresess, 6 yards waterproof cloth, 20 yards holland, a piece of green baize, two pairs of lambs•wool stockings. Most of the drapery goods were secreted between the mattrasseß. Next day I seized the house, three dams, and 75 fluming boxes. The dams and boxes fetched £20 at auction; There was about £25 worth of furniture, of •which I seized £15 worth, which, was afterwards returned to prisoner's wife. The goods which I seized were sold for £89 16s. The value of the goods that were left for him and his ■wife was about £fiO. Cross-examined : I filed a list of what I seized in the Court. In that list I put down Mrs Sheehy's clothes, &c, at i? 25, and his clothes at £10. The way I discovered that the fluming was prisoner's was by seizing it, and finding that nobody else claimed it. By the Court : I found all the groceries under prisoner's bed. One bag of flour I discovered among a lot of dirty linen. J don't know that it •wbb intended to secrete them. There was a great quantity of sheets and towellings just used once and left unwashed. I seized nothing that had been used. Robert M'Coy : lam a draper residing at Charleston. 1 supplied prisoner with some goods in April last at three different times, to the value of about £20. He did not pay for them, and the money is still owing to me. Crpss-exatrrined :< He had been in the habit of dealing with me, and had paid me a small account before. His wife ordered the goods alluded to. She took away some with her, and I took the rest to her house about 10 o'clock at night. It was not an extraordinarily large order for a* digge'rfa wife to give. I did not see Sheehy when I delivered the:goods. Francis McFarland : lam a baker residing at Charleston; I'supplied the prisoner with a bag; of flour iii April, and and another in May. lhave not been paid for them. He owes, me £4. Edward Drennan : lam a storekeeper at Charleston^ ; I Bupplted. prisoner ,wjth groceries; to the amount of £25 7e. in April and May last,

I saw some goods of the same description as those he had purchased from me among those that the bailiff seized at prisoner's house.: Two or three other witnesses were called, to give evidence of a. 6iinilar nature, and this 'closed the case for the prosecution. Mr '.Fell then raised a poinh of law in the prisoner's favor, which was, after a considerable amount of argument, overuled by the Judge The Counsel for the prosecution and defence having addressed the jury, and his Honor summed up, the jury retired, and after a shoit absence returned with n verdict of Guilty. Mr H. Adams said that having obtained a verdict in this case, he should not proceed with the three other indictments there were against the priFoner, arising out of the same transaction. The prisoner being asked if he had anything to say before sentence was passed, replic-d that he' had a wife and two children, and this was the first occasion on which he had ever appeared in a court, during a residence of twenty years in the gold fields. Mr. Fell then produced a letter from the Rev. Father Walsh, speaking of the character hitherto borne by the prisoner, after reading which, j His Honor said, Prisoner at the bar, this letter testifies to your previous good character, independently of which this is clearly your first offence. No man, however, would have the opportunity of committing such an offence us that with which you are charged unless he had previously borne a good character. You had this, but you at'used it, and I fear that the same thing is often done by those who, possessing more cleverness than you, contrive to conceal their crime. These fraudulent bankruptices, I have reason to believe, are of frequent occurrence, and I must mark the seme of the Court by passing a substantial sentence on you. The offence is of an exceedingly grave character, and is really a kind of thieving, indeed, it is rather worse than entering a tradesman's shop and stealing his goods, and yet to that I scarcely think you would have stooped. You have been guilty of abusing a law that was made for the protection of honest men. arid it is my duty to endeavour to secure the public against the recurrence of such offences. I shall not go to the limit of the law, which permits rue to give you three years' imprisonment, but shall sentence you to one year, . with hard labour. The Court was then adjourned until Tuesday, the 3rd September, for which date there is one civil case set down for hearing. Previous to the breaking up of the Court, the Registrar said that he was placed in a great difficulty with regard to the payment of the witnesses and jurors, Jtfe had written to Wellington on the 9th insfc., and had since telegraphed twice, but hud not yet received the money, and was, consequently, unable to satisfy their claims. The statement was received with undisguised symptoms of dissatisfaction by all the parties concerned.