BOTTLE THROWN AT CAR

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27395, 7 July 1954, Page 15

BOTTLE THROWN AT CAR

TWO MEN FINED £25 EACH (New Zealand Press Association) WANGANUI, July 6.

“It is my duty to impose imprisonment in these cases of gangsterism,” said Mr S, S. Preston, S.M., in the Magistrate’s Court' at Wanganui this morning. “I’ll impose it. The Judges can quash the sentence if they wish,” he added.

Earlier the Magistrate had said that he felt it his duty to impose terms of imprisonment, and if Judges wished to alter them then "they accept the responsibility.” He was commenting on a case concerning a bottle thrown from a moving car at another, breaking the driver’s window. The case was one in which there was some doubt, the Magistrate said. Any similar offences would bring heavy prison sentences. The case was one in which Stewart Hoe and Donald Wallace Reyland were jointly charged with assaulting the passengers in the car at which the bottle was thrown. Further charges against the pair were of throwing glass and of damaging the car window. Both were fined £25 with costs.

The police said Hoe was the proprietor of a milk bar and there had been some trouble with a party about payment for supper. Later Hoe and Reyland had followed the party in a car, the bottle being thrown at the top of Durie Hill. “It was the act of a gangster,” said the Magistrate.