FLOURISHED REVOLVER

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 609, 11 March 1929, Page 1

FLOURISHED REVOLVER

LOVESICK MAN’S THREAT

GIRL TELEPHONES POLICE Rejected by the girl of his choice, William Campbell appeared before her on a Mount Albert street on Saturday morning, and, flourishing a revolver, threatened to shoot himself. Campbell, a steelworker, aged 26, pleaded guilty at the Police Court this morning to being in possession o£ an unregistered firearm, keeping the weapon for longer than seven days without registering it, and procuring possession of it. He also found no reply when a complaint was made against him that he be bound

over to keep the peace. The story of love unrequited told by Senior-Sergeant O’Grady was that i Campbell had been keeping company with a young woman in Mount Albert j for about nine mouths. Prompted by , her parents, who objected to the ; match, the girl had told him that she wished to have no more to do with him. On her return from a holiday, he continued to pester her.

| “On Saturday morning he lay in wait for the girl as she went on her way to business,” continued the senior-sergeant. “He told her that he was not going to allow her to ruin other men’s lives, as she had done his. Campbell then produced a revolver and threatened to kill himself.” The girl had then run into a house, and telephoned the police, while the young man stood outside on the footpath. When the police arrived, Campbell had run to a neighbouring garage and hidden his weapon inside. At first he had denied all knowledge of the gun, but after concocting one story that he had found it in Freeman's Bay, admitted that it had been in his possession for five years. A man in a j bush camp had given it to him. i “The girl is frightened of Campi bell,” concluded the senior-sergeant, j “and on my advice is asking that he i be bound over. I think the young i-man was lovesick at the time.” ! Campbell’s explanation was that he ] was .worried. “It was only a bluff ' to see if she would take me back,” he confessed. Mr. O’Grady: He also said that he would jump over Grafton Bridge. Campbell was ordered to pay costs £1 on the first of the three charges relating to the unregistered revolver. He was bound over to keep the peace in his own recognisance of £ 10.