SUPREME COURT

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2934, 21 November 1916, Page 9

SUPREME COURT

$ ■ FRUIT MERCHANT AND SHIPPING COMPANY. Tho Chief Justice (Sir Robert Stout) presided at yesterday's sitting of the Supreme Court, and the case, taken was one brought by Griffiths and Co., fruit importers, against the Onion Steam Ship Company, claiming £790 a's tho amount considered by plaintiffs to be: due respecting damage alleged to have been caused to a shipment of 1829 cases of Fiji bananas. - Mr.- C. P. Skerrett, K.C., with whom was Mr. R. Kennedy, appeared for the plaintiffs, and Messrs. "T; M. Wilford itnd P. Levi for the defendant company. A jury of twelve was empan* helled, and Mr. John Alexander' was elected foreman. 1 Mr. Skerrett said that tile claim respected a . shipment of bananas; whioh arrived "boiled" ; the wholo 'shipment was landed in. Wellington in a condition of practical ' destruction. The bananas \vere shipped at Suva by the Talune, and arrived, at Auckland on January 31 last.- At Auckland the bananas were transhipped to the Kamona, a small, steamer whioh_ had originally been designed as a collier. When inspected in Auckland, the fruit was in good condition. When they arrived here the bananas wcro This, he said, was due to lack of suitability of the Kaniona for the work, and this unsuitability included lack of ventilation: If the bananas had arrived in good order they would have brought about lis. or 15s. a case, so that the claim at that higher rate would be £982. , The ease had not concluded when the Court rose lor the day;