The Temuka Leader SATURDAY, OCTOBER 27, 1888. ESCAPED PRISONERS.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1808, 27 October 1888, Page 2

The Temuka Leader SATURDAY, OCTOBER 27, 1888. ESCAPED PRISONERS.

Thebb appears to be something altogether rotten in gaol management in this colony. The reading of accounts of the escaping of prisoners is becoming almost monotonous. It has lost a great deal of the novelty which was once attached to such items of news, but, what is still more extraordinary, those who have recently escaped are still at large, and likely to be. In this there is evidence of laxity of discipline or incapacity in both gaol and police management. It was undoubtedly carelessness that allowed the prisoners to escape, and the fact that the police have been unable to recapture]! them indicates that the service is not so efficient as we should wish. Three or four prisoners have escaped within the last three or four monthi, not one of whom has been recaptured. If prisoners were to continue to escape at this rate, we should soon be over-run with them, and we should be living in a state of terror, especially when the confidence in the efficiency of the police is shaken by their inability to recapture them. This is a very serious matter. No one knows when these prisoners may combine with others and go into the bushranging or burglary business, and not only despoil honest people of their worldly goods, but perhaps destroy human life. We are told some gaolers are being disrated and removed in punishment for having allowed prisoners to escape. It is only right, and jast, and proper that they should be punished, and that prison discipline should be most rigorously enforced. Mr O'Brien, the gaoler at Lyttelton, is amongst those who must suffer, and we are told that the Lyttelton people are getting excited over it. Mr O'Brien is being punished on account of the escape of Jonathan Eoberts, and according to the reports to hand the people in Lyttelton think that he has not deserved it. Jonathan Roberts, it appears, was sent to work at Eipa Island against Mr O'Brien's wish. He suggested that it would be risky to send him there, and that it would be far safer to keep him within the precincts of the gaol. If this is true, and there is no other charge against Mr O'Brien, his punishment is most unjust. If the man was sent to Eipa Island in opposition to his will, and he was allowed to escape by the persons in charge of him, it is monstrous injustice to punish Mr O'Brien for it, and such punishment, instead of having a salutary effect, must exercise a demoralising influence on the service. There is nothing so well calculated to create a feeling of insecurity, discontent, and irritation as unfair and unjust treatment, such as Mr O'Brien has ostensibly been subjected to. Injustice can only lead to contempt of authority, for only a partial and incapable administration can be guilty of it. But the question is, has Mr O'Brien been guilty of any dereliction of duty other than that of the escape of Jonathan Eoberts ? Our opinion is that there must have been some other cause for disrating him, for surely no one could possibly be so stupid as to punish him for what he was not in the least responsible for. That is the point, and it is a point, too, that the public of Lyttelton ought to inquire into before getting up indignation meetings and interfering with the discipline and management of the service. If Mr O'Brien has been neglectful of his duties, then by all means he ought to be punished for it; if, on the contrary, his case is as stated, then to disrate him is most outrageously unjust and unfair, and can only be put down as a piece of mean, contemptible jobbery. We know nothing about Mr O'Brien. We have never seen him, and never heard of ; anything to his advantage or disadvantage, but it appears to us that if there is nothing but Jonathan Roberts's escape against him, he is unfairly dealt with. There is behind all this the fact that all this prison-

breaking has occurred since the rage for retrenchment set in, Has retrenchment destroyed the efficiency of the service ? If so it is very dear retrenchment, for undoubtedly large sums of money have been spent in the effort to recapture escaped prisoners. There is evidently a screw loose somewhere. Such an epidemic of escaping from gaol could not have taken place without something being wrong, and we hope that whatever it is, the authorities will take immediate steps to put it right.