EMBEZZLEMENT.

Taranaki Daily News, 3 July 1922, Page 5

EMBEZZLEMENT.

YOUNG OFFICIAL’S ACTION. Dunedin, June 30. Edward, 'Hedley Kitchener aged 24, Government savings bank officer, was committed for sentence on a charge of theft of £lOOO. Defendant in a statement admitted using £2OO to make up moneys previously tampered with, and put the remaining £BOO into a business at Woodside, where he was arrested. GOVERNMENT MONEYS. WARNINGS FROM JUDGE. Some ’ remarks l egr.rding embezzlement by Government officials werd made by Mr. Justice Herdman in the Hamilton Supreme Court when sentencing a young clerk, Stanley Richard Edwards, from the Government Tourist Office at Rotorua, who had pleaded guilty to misappropriating £BO belonging to the department. Mr. MacDairmid said that accused had taken the money to help a friend who had no idea the money was coming from an illegitimate source. Accused regarded it as a temporary loan, hut his friend failed to return it. Accused had not benefited in any way himself. He was a married man who had never been in trouble before and restitution had been made. Counsel asked that probation be granted. Mr. Gillies, Crown Prosecutor, said that the offence took place nearly a year ago and accused covered up his defalcations until they were discovered by the auditor. His Honor said that time after time these cases were coming before h : "*i and were becoming far too common in New Zealand. Something would have to be done to stamp it ’out. Ir was becming a disgrace to New Zealand and could not be stamped out by the imposition of fines or granting of probation The only curse was to send prisoner to gaol, which he hoped would bu a lesson to him and to others, and it would impress upon them that imprisonment was the risk they ran for tampering with other people’s money. Prisoner would be sentenced to reformative treatment not exceeding 12 months.