Hit 'Em Hard

NZ Truth, Issue 1184, 9 August 1928, Page 6

Hit 'Em Hard

IJAS our system of justice been badly .bitten by something recently and gbne cleanroff its head or is it jiist a little sillier than usual? . Admittedly men may not be so muoh to blsme for this piebald "justice" as is the system, but the trouble does not end with .the, system. / ■ V ; "N.z; TTruth" latterly has given cases of shooting disparities m sentences-r—instances ; ; where the major offender gets chicken-feed punishment and the minor (jlelin--quent, m- expressive if not literal phrase, " gets it m the neck. " . The srteak thief of a packet of pins from a : shop counter is an irritating; pest -who^ must be stopped . and who usually is stopped. Rather he; does the stdppihg'. He stops "inside. •' ! \ But, consider the drunken driver behind the wheel of ' what becdmeSj m, iis lielpless hands, a fearsome modern juggernaut. He threatens a ; whole streetfiil 6f SIII7--je.ots and : a whole communityful of liberty.^ And yet how frequently he escapes with a fine! He's not only a pest. He's a sheer menace. Too often this gentle fraternity is stroked by the .velvet glove of the law instead pi : [being smashed by its mailed figt.