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Youth's desperate plea for release accepted
Justices of the Peace accepted a teenager?s plea for release to return to his dying mother after he was arrested for burglary.
Police had opposed bail, but an impassioned plea from defence counsel Ruth Buddicom persuaded the justices to allow the youth bail after he stood in the dock wiping tears away with his shirt.
Miss Buddicom said the youth had become desperate and had ?resorted to the only thing he knows? to get what was needed to carry on.
The youth cannot be named because of the discussion of his criminal record in this report. He had been arrested for a burglary yesterday and appeared at the Saturday morning sitting of the Christchurch District Court, where Justices of the Peace sit in place of the usual judge.
Miss Buddicom acknowledged he had only recently been released from prison.
His mother, aged 37, was dying of cancer and had come to Christchurch to spend some time with him. He was responsible for providing for her care at a home they were sharing, but it had no phone, nor power, and no food.
He had been trying to get financial help from Work and Income, the Prisoners? Aid and Rehabilitation Society, and the Probation Service because he had not yet been able to arrange a benefit and was unemployed.
When he found his mother curled up on the floor, extremely cold, he had resorted to other means.
The youth wanted a remand on bail to Monday, so that he could return to care for his mother and arrange for family to come down from Auckland immediately, to escort her back and care for her there.
He will willing to abide by a 24-hour-a-day curfew at the home in Papanui. ?He wants the opportunity to do the right thing,? she said.
Justices of the Peace Nick Atkins and Bruce Dawson agreed to release him till Monday.
Mr Atkins said: ?We have listened to your counsel. I just hope for your sake all the facts are true and we are not being dished out a load of porkies.?
He imposed the 24-hour curfew for the youth to be at home caring for his mother.
?The police will be checking on you regularly,? he warned. ?If you breach it the world will come down on top of you.?
