TWENTY YEARS’ GAOL.

Taranaki Daily News, 12 May 1922, Page 5

TWENTY YEARS’ GAOL.

SENTENCE FOR MANSLAUGHTER. JUDGE’S SEVERE COMMENT. By Telegraph.—Press Association. Auckland, May IlArthur William Page, found guilty of manslaughter in connection with the death of Gladys Hutchinson at Pipiroa, was sentenced to twenty years’ hard labor. Mr. Justice Stringer said: “In convicting you of manslaughter rather than of the capital charge of murder the jury adopted a most merciful view o'f the case reasonably open to them. They evidently thought that, having regard to the illicit ’relationship which existed between you and the unfortunate woman whose life you destroyed, it was probable, or at least possible, that • at the time a quarrel had taken place between you and her, and that you, inflamed with drink and having a gun in your hands, in a sudden passion and without premeditation, fired the fatal shot. The facts as proved before them would have justified the jury in finding you guilty of murder, but in view of all the circumstances, it was probably natral, and not unreasonable, that they should have adopted the more merciful course which it was within their province to do. 1 cannot, however, regard the crime of which you have been convicted 'as other than the most callous and brutal character, divided only by a very thin partition from that of actual murder. Holding this opinion, and considering your past record, I do not think I should be doing my duty if I passed upon you a less sentence than that you be imprisoned with hard labor for twenty years.” I