AN IMPORTANT CASE.

Gisborne Times, Volume XVIII, Issue 1429, 13 April 1905, Page 2

AN IMPORTANT CASE.

remarkable technical

DEFENCE,

I (Per Press Association.) I Auckland, last night. I At the Supreme Court, before Mr I Justice Edwards, an appeal of considerable I interest to the occupiers of land was I opened up, in the case of David Ross v. j David Gordon, heard at Cambridge. Mr j Blair appeared for appellant, and Hon J. I A.„Tole for defendant, Inspeotor under the Noxious Weeds Act. The question raised I was whether the occupier of land is liable [ to prosecution for failure to clear his land of noxious weeds, as provided by the Act. I Mr Blair agreed that the Aob did not provide any penalty for failure to clear land lof noxious weedß. There was a clause I providing that if any person committed j any offence against any of the provisions I of the Act he should be liable to a penalty, but the only clauses in the Act which I oreated offences were sections S, 9, and 19, I which made it an offence to sow noxious I weeds, to fail to clean out threshing I machines, and to hinder any Inspeotor in I the execution of his duty. ■ It was conI tended that the list of offences within the I Act were exhausted in these sections. There was a duty cast on each oocupier to clear his land, but failure to do so only gave the Inspeotor the right to enter, and to work at the expense of the occupier without in any way making the occupier liable to criminal proceedings. Mr Tole contended that the word “ offence’' meant a contravention of the Act, and so long as there was any omission to comply with the Aot. section 20, the penal clause, was sufficient authority for tho Magistrate to convict; a clear duty was imposed upon land holder. His Honor reserved his decision.