RESIDENT MAGISTRATE’S COURT.

Evening Star, Issue 3529, 15 June 1874, Page 2

RESIDENT MAGISTRATE’S COURT.

Saturday, June 13. (Before J. Bathgate, li'sq., R.M.) More Quarrelling. —The hearing of the case of Lofous v. Cowell was continued after we went to press on Saturday. The following dialogue ensued on Mr Smith, at a certain sta e of the proceedings, declaring that he bad not replied.—Mr Barton ; Mr “mith says he has not replied, and I contend he has. —Mr Smith ; Most certainly I did not reply —Mr Barton ; You did reply. 1 will refer it to the whole Court if you did not.—Mr : I have not yet furnished my reply and I shall certainly insist upon my right to do so, until I am asked by the Court to sit down.—His Worship : I must ask the counsel on both sides to confine their remarks to the point as to whether or not Mr Smith has any light to bring forward fresh evidence.--Mr Smith ; Evidence has been given which , shows Plainly that one or other of the witi nesses has told an untruth. The Court has no other means of enabling it to arrive at a satisfactory decision than by foil .wing the course f propose and calling other evidence it ought to be quite sufficient for me to suggest that there'is such evidence in existence. The 20th section of the Justices of the reace Act strongly confirms iny view that this Court has no rignt to refuse evidence which is calculated to elicit the truth of the statements made.—Mr Barton : The Court is not going to be intimidated by you in that kind of way. There is no use in you trying that sort of thing here.—Mr Smith ; I have no intention of making any attempt to intimidate this Court. Section 20 of the Act puts me, I submit, in a position to claim as a right that I should be allowed to call furthey evidence. Even although the right had not been conferred by statute, 1 contend that it is the duty of the Court to call such eviaence, so as to enable it to come to a decision

between these two conflicting statements. I therefore prupose to call Captain Friaton to give evidence upon this new point.—Mr Barton : There is no new point.—His Worship said that full opportunity having been given to the informant to put the case properly before the Court, and behaving closed his ease, it could not be re-opened. If the prosecution were allowed to supplement its statements, a similar privilege would have to be accorded to the defence, and there would be no end to it. —Mr Smith : Then as I understand it, your Worship does not desire to hear further evidence.—Mr Barton : That is an exceed'ngly improper remark for Mr Smith to make. His Worship ; That is my ruling, I have no doubt on the punt. Any further evidence would be quite inadmissible. The matter then dropped, and his Worship reserved his decision. Monday, June 15. (Before J. Bathgate, Esq., R.M.) A Host of Bibulants. —Alex. Grant, for being drunk and disorderly, was fined ss. with the option of forty-eight hours’ imprisonment ; as also were Alexander Brown, Augustus Sourdon, Charles Burgess, and James Knox ; George O’Brien, 10s, or three days ; Jane Kelsham 20s, or fourteen days; George Watt 40s, with a similar alternative. V age an cY. - A nneM ‘Namara, an * ‘ Asiatic, ” who had been twice convicted of drunkenness since her arrival here, was now charged with having no visible means of support.— Constable Moore said prisoner was a brothelkeeper. She was in the habit of loitering in Princes street for the purpose of picking up drunken men. She had no place of abode and no fixed way of getting her living.— Prisoner was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment, with hard labor. _ A Young Thief.— Edward Ryan, about eighteen years of age, was charged, on the information of David Mason, grocer, with stealing one pig’s head of the value of 2a “Edward Mason said that prisoner went to his shop on Friday evening and' asked for three pennyworth of lollies. Witness missed a pig’s head from the shop immediately after. Constable Bain said that he found the pig’s head produced planted in the yard of a house occupied by one John Gately When he took the head to Masen, the latter said, “That’s my heal” (loud"laughter) ; witness replying, “ Not your head, but the pig’s head.’'—(Renewed laughter.) Sergt Dean said he arrested prisoner at Gately’s house. Gately is known as a notorious thief and au “old hand.”—Prisoner was then further charged with stealing from the bar of the Prince Alfred Hotel a till containing 9s. He pleaded guilty. Hia Worship said he could not find the prisoner guilty ®n the first charge, though he bad no moral doubt whatever that he was the thief ; but the evidence did not distinctly enough identify him as the person who stole the head, it was quite possible that Gately or someone else might have stolen it. He had pleaded guilty to the second charge, and certainly it was a very impudent theft. —(Addressing prisoner): Now, sir, there is no excuse for theft in this country; everyone who is willing can gam an honest living. You say you came from ■■Sydney.—(Prisoner : From Victoria.)— Then 1 advise you to return there as soon as your sentence of three months is completed. The police now have their eye on you, and your character is damaged here.—Sub-Inspector Mallard : It is already’ damaged there too Prisoner :It never was.—The Sub-Inspector: He has also been in gaol there,—His Worship then advised prisoner to leave the Colony as soon as he could.

Embezzlement. —J. C. Aberuethy was charged with embezzling, on June 10, the sum of Ll3 16s, the property of his employers, Messrs brown, Ewing, and Co.— Thomas Brown, of the firm of Brown, Ewing, and Co., said the prisoner was a clerk in their firm. From something he heard he got the receipt produced from A. C, Begg. Prisoner’s signature is attached to it. He was not authorised to collect the money, nor is it accounted for in the books of the firm. A remand till to-morrow was applied for ■nd granted. Ship Desertion.— Loftus v. Cowell was a charge ship desertion, heard on Saturday last, in which his Worship was now about to deliver judgment, when virßarton asked to be allowed to make a remark with regard to Mr Saunders’s evidence; but Mr Smith had objected to its being commented on, unless he (Mr Barton( intended to offer any other evidence. Captain Priston and the learned counsel who appeared for Captain Loftus at the Police Court, Port Chalmers, were in attendance, and were prepared to disclose the conversation that took place outside that Court. It was wholly objectionable for Mr Barton to offer any comment on bis partner’s—Mr Saunders—evidence. It should be taken like any other evidence; for what it was worth.—His Worship decided that he could not hear any comments.—Mr Barton :1 do not wish to make any comment if objected to.—Mr shall sit down.—His Worship then gave judgment as follows ;

it proved that the informant, master of the Trevelyan, made an agreement with the defendant to grant him his discharge, on condition of another mate being obtained, and that m the meantime he required the defendant’s services during the discharge of cargo, which were duly rendered; that thereafter, on or about 16th May, the master took delivery from the defendant of the books, papers, and things m his charge as chief-officer, and permitted him to leave the ship and take his clothes with him, in the belief that his services were not further required; that at the same time the master told bun he would hold the certificate till he got another mate and the ship cleared; that the defendant instituted proceedings against the master in the Supreme Court, for redress of certain wrongs alleged to be inflicted upon him by the master; that on the 4th June, when the master cleared the ship at the Custom House he did not return tbe defendant as a deserter, he knowing then from a letter received a fortnight previously from the defendant’s solicitor, that the defendant did not intend to return to the ship, and considered himself under no obligation to do so: that on the sth June the master laid an information against the defendant for desertion, after he had been absent twenty days from the ship, which was heard before the Justices of the Peace at Port Chalmers on the 6th June, and dismissed; that immediately after the case was heard the master ordered the defendant to go on hoard, and that he did not do so ; that the master, on the 9th June, laid an information against the defendant for deser tion on the 6th June; that at the time the informant laid that information, he believed that he had obtained the services of another chief officer; that on the evening of the 9th he was informed that the person with whom he had agreed on the 7th could not go with him; that next .day, 10th June, before the warrant under the information was executed, the informant did secure the services of another chief officer who was duly entered upon the ship’s articles • that the defendant appeared to answer the charge contained in the information on the 12th June; and that although the master agreed to discharge the defendant if he got another mate' yet up to this time the defendant has not been duly discharged in terms of the statute. I km satisfied that if the defendant had not instituted proceedings against the informant, the charge made would not have been preferred; fM laTU °, f opinion that in the circumstances the defendant is not gqilty of desertion. A penal enactment must be strictly interpreted. esertion, or the act of leaving or quitting the ship and service without just cause, in other words running away, is too serious a charge, and in the case of a chief officer attended by consequences top rumpus to be supported in any way but by facts and circumstances which leaye po doqbfc that the offenb© has beeq cbnp

blitted. Whether the evidence laid would have supported a charge for the minor offence of refusing to join the ship, or being absent without leave, I cannot consider under this information. But I am satisfied the charge of desertion cannot be maintained. There. is every reason to believe that the proceedings on both sides are mutually vexatious, and the result of mutual bad feeling. I strongly recommend both parties to endeavor to come to an amicable arrangement. Information dismissed, with costs. MAKING ILLEGAL FALSE ENTRY. Cowell v. Loftua. -In this case defendant, master of the Trevelyan, was charged by the mate of the ship with making a false entry.—Mr Barton: 1 am sorry your Worship anticipated what I was about to say, by making that concluding remark. As far as the mate is concerned, you will easily enough see he stands in the position of being ruined for life, if these entries are allowed to go Borne. lam instructed to say that there was no malice on his part. I came into Court with the intention, in the event of your Worship coming to the conclusion to which you have arrived, to ask the other side to expunge these entries from the log ; therefore my client has no desire to prosecute for the false entries. All that he wants is to be discharged, and to get hia certificate, so as to be able to go on board the Mabel Jane. The captain is quite aware that he is appointed master of her. lam told that the Mabel Jane is gone, so it is too late for him to carry out that bargain. He has no vindictive feeling, no wish to have the captain tried though I must say he richly deserves it for making such malicious entries. I now ask if the other side be willing that these statements be expunged, in which case I will drop these proceedings. —Hia Worship suggested that the other side should be allowed time to consider the proposal, but Mr Barton insisted on an immediate decision. If the matter was adjourned for hours the vessel might get away, and the entry go , Some unoontraiicted.—Mr no objection to have the statements expunged. Doubtless they were inaccurate,—His Worship : They arc more than that. When these entries are expunged the proceedings drop. lam very glad to hear it. They must be expunged in of the Collector of Customs. Mr Barton; No doubt the Collector will take very good care that the log book does not leave him till that is done. I would' ask >our Worship to grant a certificate of dismissal ; your Worship is aware that we are entitled to such a certificate, and we intend to ask both benches to giant them, so as to prevent a possibility of Mr Cowell being injured in England.—Hia Worship; Granted. —Mr Barton ; Does your Worship make any order respecting costs»—His Worship : The usual order in a dismissal case is with costs. Lee v. Kroon.—• Haim, Ll9, fer obstructing a right-of-way in George street. Mr Stout for plaintiff; Mr Stewart for defendant. After hearing evidence, his Worship gave judgment for 20s, with costs.