A BUILDER'S BANKRUPTCY

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 57, 29 August 1911, Page 5

A BUILDER'S BANKRUPTCY

UNUSUAL FEATURES. AT" " ;^ By Talegrapb—Press Association. Auckland, Last Night. John George Hobson, formerly a builder in Auckland, who pleaded guilty last week to two out of four counts, charging him with breaches of the Bankruptcy Act in failing to keep proper lwoks' and incurring debts at a tame when he had no reasonable or probable expectation of paying them, was brought t up before Mr. Justice Chapman for sen- ' tencc at the Supreme Court to-day. Mr. Earl appeared for the prisoner, and pointed out the extraordinary and unusual circumstances surrounding the tankimptcy. For years the prisoner worked on wages as a joiner, and was a steady, hard-working and clean living man, and rigorously honorable. In January last he started in Ibusiness as a builder, and was adjudicated a 'bankrupt on My 7. His business career was meteoric. He commenced to build on allotments on which he had not paid a deposit, and employed a large staff' on work which could not possibly be profitable. William Rowe gave evidence on the mental change that had taken place in the prisoner. From a quiet and' steady man, he developed a violence of language and rashness in speculation that indicated he was not rational. He opened a shop, filled it with second-hand furniture, started a joinery shop, and then wanted to embark in a pork butchery shop. A further remand was granted till Friday so that in the meantime prisoner may be examined.