ESCAPING FROM GAOL

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 276, 11 February 1928, Page 13

ESCAPING FROM GAOL

WARNING TO GRANT FLOGGING THREATENED “I think the officials are partly to blame for my escape. Had there been more efficiency shown, escape would have been impossible,” said William Henry Grant, when he appeared before Mr. Justice Reed in the Supreme Court this morning for sentence after having been found guilty of assaulting a warder and attempting to escape from gaol. Prisoner, who was not represented, asked his Honour for a ruling on the verdict of the jury. “I take it,” said his Honour, “that the jury decided you had committed the offence, but that it was not premeditated. That you committed it on the spur of the moment while caught escaping.” Prisoner then made the allegation of inefficiency, but his Honour said there was sufficient efficiency in the gaol. “I don’t know whether you are aware of the maximum penalty for this charge,” continued the Judge, “but it is regarded so seriously by the law that you are liable to imprisonment for life as well as three floggings.” Referring to the career of the prisoner, his Honour said he had commenced when very young by stealing. He followed this by a series of theft charges, spending a great deal of time in gaol, until he was declared an habitual criminal. He had seriously considered the advisibility of ordering a flogging in this case, but a Judge was always hesitant in doing that. In view of the fact that the prisoner had shown no brutality, and because there was not a prevalence of such offences, he would not impose a flogging. It was a difficult question to know what to do with the prisoner, and he was going to do something that might seem peculiar. The prisoner would be ordered to come up for sentence any time within the next five years. And any future breach would be met with a flogging. CAUTURED AT RAURIMU ESCAPEE’S FREEDOM ENDED Press Association. TAUMAEUNUI, To-day. Darrel Barnaby, who escaped from the Waikeria prison camp, near Te Awamutu, on Thursday, was recaptured this morning at the top of the spiral at Raurimu, by Gaoler Glynn and Chief-Warder Chapman, of Waikune prison camp.