LITTLE CRIME

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 124, 16 August 1927, Page 13

LITTLE CRIME

WANGANUI SESSIONS JUDGE’S CONGRATULATIONS ♦ Press Association. WANGANUI. To - day. In the Supreme Court Mr. Justice Reed congratulated the district 0.l the absence of crime. There were only two prisoners for sentence. Gilbert Joseph Michael McGrath was sentenced to one year’s reformative treatment for theft of £126 3s lid from the Railway Departmetn at Ohakune by falsifying pay-sheets, time-sheets, etc. marked that the only way to prevent His Honour, in passing sentence, rethis sort of thing was to pass a sentence which would be a deterrent to others in a similar position. The Crown Prosecutor explained that in the lower court it had been hinted that under the system it was easy to manipulate the funds of the Railway Department, but he assured the court that it was the best possible system the department could adopt short of going out and counting the men employed on the permanent way. Peneki Simon was sentenced to seven years’ hard labour on a charge of rape. and carnal knowledge of a girl aged 11 years at Ore Ore. The judge remarked that it was a particularly bad case, and had accused been a European he would have considered the infliction of corporal punishment.