INDECENT EXPOSURE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 September 1943, Page 3

INDECENT EXPOSURE

MASTERTON MAN SENT TO GAOL. THREE MONTHS’ IMPRISONMENT. On a charge of indecent and obscene exposure in Queen Street yesterday afternoon, Leslie Patrick J. P. Rees, aged 27 years, married, of Masterton, was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment with hard labour when he appeared in the Magistrate’s Court this morning before Messrs L. J. Taylor and R. Blennerhassett, J’s.P.

Senior Sergeant C. Murphy said a young married woman and her child were proceeding to the hospital yesterday afternoon at about 2.30 o’clock and while crossing the Waipoua bridge they observed the accused. A complaint was made to the police and to Constable A. W. Nalder Rees admitted the offence. In a written statement Rees stated that he had committed a similar offence that afternoon before a number of young girls between 14 and 15 years of age. The Senior Sergeant said Rees was admitted to probation for a similar offence in October, 1935, when he was 19 years of age.

Rees, who pleaded guilty, stated that he was under the influence of liquor when he committed the offence. " Major Stone, of the Salvation Army, asked that Rees be admitted to probation and that his name be suppressed for the sake of Rees’s relatives. Mr Taylor said the offence was a serious one and that the Bench could not possibly order that the accused’s name be suppressed. A sentence of three months’ imprisonment with hard labour was imposed.