Attempted Arson

NZ Truth, Issue 1146, 17 November 1927, Page 9

Attempted Arson

'pRISONER is not entitled to any sympathy and I am not going to ask for any," said Lawyer W. E. Leicester, m his opening remarks to Mr. Justice MacGregor m the Wellington Supreme Court last week, when James Perry came up for sentence. Perry, a few days previously, had pleaded guilty to "*■ attempted arson. He is at present serving a sentence of five years' imprisonment for breaking and entering, which term was imposed upon him m September by Mr. Justice Reed. When passing sentence' in that ■instance, said Lawyer Leicester, his honor had before him a police report on the charge of arson, to which Perry had then pleaded not guilty. | "I dp not think," added counsel, "that he is so base that he would attempt to set fire to the place when there was a child m the house." Crown Prosecutor Mac^rs-y said that about the time of ' ' j.'fence, there had been an epidemic of fires .at Kilbirnie, but Perry had only ' been charged with one offence. If the child m the house had not cried, it might have been burned to death or smothered. „< The judge imposed a sentence of seven years' hard labor, to run concurrently with the term Perry is at present serving. x