DRUNKEN SOLDIERS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 25 November 1941, Page 6

DRUNKEN SOLDIERS

MILITARY POLICE SHOULD DEAL WITH THEM. MAGISTRATE’S COMMENT. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) ' AUCKLAND, Novembei’ 24. After he had dealt with two Maori soldiers and a pakeha soldier charged with fighting, and a pakeha sergeant who admitted assaulting a police constable, Mr F. H. Levien, commenting on the numbers of soldiers who wandered about, many of them under the influence of liquor, said it was the duty of the military police to remove such men from the streets. In future, said the Magistrate, soldiers in uniform who misbehaved themselves would be dealt with more severely. “It appears to me that the civil police round up these men and military officers later come to court and speak on behalf of the soldier offenders,” said the Magistrate. Military police should be placed in the position to deal with men in uniform who are found drunk about the town. It is not an uncommon thing to see soldiers wandering about the streets under the influence of liquor. In my opinion there should be some method of preventing excessive drinking by soldiers and, secondly, there should be a stronger force of military police on duty in the city to remove from the streets those soldiers who do not behave themselves.”