FOOL, NOT KNAVE

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 526, 1 December 1928, Page 1

FOOL, NOT KNAVE

COUNSEL DESCRIBES CLIENT YOUNG MAN GIVEN CHANCE “A fool rather than a knave,” was how Mr. J. F. W. Dickson described his client, Leon Smith Coburn, a draper’s assistant, aged 22, at the Police Court this morning. Coburn appeared for sentence, having pleaded guilty on Wednesday to stealing a pair of shoes valued at £ 3 19s 6d from Selwyn Innes Jones. “I remember him.” remarked Mr. F. K. Hunt, S.M. “He stole a pair of shoes from the Parnell Baths, leaving the owner to walk home barefooted.*' Counsel explained that Coburn had been employed by a draper up to six months ago. He had then been due for a rise in salary, so his employer dismissed him, taking on a younger boy at a lower wage.- Coburn had been out of work ever since. Mr. Hunt: He should do his bathing from the beach, then, instead of paying to enter the baths. He probably went there with the idea of stealing in his mind. Mr. Dickson mentioned that the boy had not previously been before tlie Court and would not offend again. “I have been told,” he concluded, “that the boy is more of a fool than a knave.” Coburn was admitted to probation for a year, an appeal for suppression of name being i-efused. “Wo have had too many of these thefts from swimming baths,” commented the magistrate.