Fined £20 On Two Charges (Press, 20 May 1959)
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Summary: Fined £20 On Two Charges (Press, 20 May 1959)
On 19 May 1959, a 26-year-old nursing orderly, Barry Charles Saunders, was sentenced in the Magistrate’s Court at Lower Hutt for attempting to send indecent matter through the post. Saunders faced two charges and was fined £10 for each charge by Mr W. S. Spence, S.M., who also ordered the destruction of the indecent materials. During the proceedings, Saunders' defence counsel, Mr E. B. Robertson, argued that his client had been lured into this behaviour by magazines sold in Wellington that deceptively marketed themselves as health and strength publications but included thinly disguised advertisements of a homosexual nature. The court acknowledged that while the letters involved were indeed indecent, the photographs could be considered less so unless linked with the letters. The letters were intended for Australia, where the photographs had originated. This case reflects the societal attitudes towards indecency and homosexuality in New Zealand during the late 1950s.
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