“DISGRACE TO UNIFORM”

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 717, 17 July 1929, Page 11

“DISGRACE TO UNIFORM”

VAGRANCY OF EX-NAVAL TRAINEE BAD INFLUENCE ON GIRL “He is a blackguard, but he is too young to send to gaol. He has been disgracing the navy by going about in uniform in this dirty state. They put the police on him and this is what they found. 1 ' So Mr. F. K. Hunt, S.M., commented after hearing the evidence against John Alexander Inness, aged 23, who was charged with vagrancy at the Police Court this morning. Mr. Noble appeared for accused and entered a plea of not guilty. Constable Hanna, who arrested accused and a girl who was with him, said that he found the pair in the Ferry Buildings at 5.45 in the morning. Inness had done nothing since he had been discharged from the navy on June 6. Mr. Noble: The Royal Naval Reserve, not the navy. Witness said that accused had a pass to go to Wellington, but had lost it or said he had. He was going about the street in naval uniform two weeks after his discharge and the authorities had called in the police to look for him. When arrested he had ss, part of the proceeds from pawning a ring oil the day previous. The girl had no money. Mr. Noble was of the opinion that the young man could hardly be called a vagrant as he had money. He and the girl had been to a party on a ship and the girl had been told to be in by midnight. The party had not broken up until 1.30 and the girl was too afraid of her mistress to go home. It was not through the young man, as had been suggested, that she had lost her position. Inness was ordered to come up for sentence within six months. Brenda Harper, aged 18, the girl who was arrested with Inness, pleaded guilty on a charge of vagrancy. The chief-detective said that she was really a child and her relatives were prepared to take her back into the country. On the suggestion of Major Annie Gordon, the girl was admitted to probation for 12 months in order that her future conduct might be supervised.