RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3630, 1 March 1883, Page 2

RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT.

This Day

(.Before Captain Preecc, E.M.) I-lurry Viviun. plodded JTuilty g-uilty to a. charge of drunkenness, and was fined os iuid costs, or in default 48 hours' imprisonment with hard labor. LUX.VCY. John Herbert was charged, on the inforniatioa of Constable Dalton, with lunacy. Sergeant Burtonshaw said the prisoner came to him eight or nine days ago and said he felt very unwell. He (the sergeant) thereupon saw Mr Miller, and got the man admitted to the Old Men's Home. A few days later on, visiting , the home, he found Herbert had suddenly taken his leave and departed without his blankets, being under an hallucination that the other inmates meant evil towards him. Since then he had been wandering about the Rissington estate, where apprehensions for his safety, and also that of others whom he might come across, were felt, and a search party was sent out by Mr Hutchinson to look after and capture him. When the prisoner was eventually discovered he was in a very weak state, having eaten nothing for three days. Constable Dalton, being sworn, said the prisoner was brought to him at Taradale yesterday by a man named "William Williams, who gave him in custody as a lunatic. On the way into town prisoner asked witness where ho was taking him to, and he said "to the Hospital." "Oh," the prisoner replied, "I don't want to go there, for they will poison mo with pitch and tar." He also asked, when he saw the blankets in his cell, if it was intended to smother him, and altogether acted like an insane person. The Court remanded Herbert for a week for medical examination.