SENTENCES ON SPIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 December 1938, Page 5

SENTENCES ON SPIES

THE UNITED STATES TRIAL OBSERVATIONS BY ;JUDGE. “PUERILE AND CONTEMPTIBLE RING.” By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. NEW YORK, December 3. The first sentences for espionage in the United States of America since the Great War were meted out today on four Nazi agents when Voss was sentenced to six years' imprisonment. Johanna Hofmann to four years and Glaser and Rumrich to two years each. Judge Knox commented: “We can take a small measure of comfort from the fact that the Germans have shown but little improvement ovex- the bungling efforts of von Papen and von Bernstorff during the World War. Puerile and contemptible as this ring ■was, it is part of a system which cannot be tolerated.” He added that the sentences were mild compared with what would have been inflicted if the defendants had been convicted in Germany. He expressed sorrow for Hoffmann, whom he described as “clay in the hands of persons flushed with success in restoring German national pride.” If she alone had been involved, he said, he would have, been glad to withhold sentence and send her back to Germany. The judge criticised “the ineptitude of the protective agency which was responsible for the escape of William Lonkowski, the contact man, and DiIgnatz Griebl.”