DOMINION NEWS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIX, Issue 2, 23 April 1914, Page 3

DOMINION NEWS.

THRASHED AT SCHOOL. [Per Press Association. ) Wanganui, April 22. A case of much interest to school teachers was concluded at the 5.31. Court to-day. E. C. Jennings, first assistant at the Wanganui East school. Mas charged with assaulting a ten-year-old hoy named McWilliams. It was alleged that owing to McWilliams’ inability to do sums which had been taught while ho was in the hospital undergoing an operation, he was thrown on the floor by .Jennings and severely thrashed, the bruises being apparent lor some time. The defence \w as that the punishment was for insolence and insubordination, and was not excessive. The teacher had put the boy over his knees and adminisi'tred six strokes with the strap, when the boy, who was resisting, wriggled on to the floor, where ho received two more strokes. 'Hie Magistrate, in dismissing the information, held that the punishment was merited and not excessive. MUNICIPALITIES BORROWING. Palmerston X., April 22. A poll was taken on a proposal to raise a loan of £IOO,OOO, of which £65,000 is for the purchase of gasworks, £30,000 for extending and enlarging, and £SOOO for the purchase and acquisition of lands with or with- , cut buildings for offices and showrooms, and resulted in 711 for and 270 against, and ten informal, out of 2500 ratepayers. Wellington, April 22. Petone ratepayers carried to-day proposals to raise a loan of £40,000 for the installation of a motor omnibus ■orvice, and the improvement of the foreshore.

HASSTUAL CRIMINALS. Wellington, April 22. Regarding the statements made by uolice and magistrate at Palmerston North respecting the efficacy or otherwise of the restraint of a probationary license upon a habitual criminal after,his release by the Prison Board, the Chief Justice stated to a reporter to-day; “I have seen the statements. 1 am afraid the person who made the remarks supposed to have been made joes not appreciate the position or mode of dealing with habitual criminals. The Prison Board has felt that the mere fact of a man being made a habitual criminal does not mean that ■the prisoner is to be kept in gaol for the. rest of bis natural life. It means that, the duty of the Prison Board is to try to redeem him, to give him a chance of redeeming himself, and so free himself from gaol. The- Board knows, and everybody must know, fcjiat a criminal epnnov fie, .expected to reform all at ouep. It is the-duty of the Board-to make an elfort time and iyain to reform him. An Ancient Book says that we should forgive om-

f'liemy, ‘even unto seventy times seven.’ The Board does not expect that a person released on probation vill necessarily become all af once a food citizen, There will be lapses, but if it is laid down that if a man is once declared, a habitual there U :o he no further hope for him, and that he must remain in gaol for the rest of his life, there is no need for a Prion Board or for the habitual crini:nal system at all. It will be merely necessary to sentence a man to imnrisonment for life.”