MAGISTRATES’ COURTS

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1632, 14 May 1879, Page 3

MAGISTRATES’ COURTS

CHRISTCHURCH. Wednesday, May 14. [Before G. L. Mellish, Esq., R.M.] Maintenance. —John Alexander Bourhill was summoned for neglecting to support his illegitimate child. The defendant admitted the paternity of the child, and was ordered to pay 5b per week towards its support. Failing to Provide. —John Bull was charged with failing to provide his two children with adequate means of support. Mr B. D. Thomas appeared for the defendant. There was no appearance of the complainant, and the information was dismissed.

Protection. —Jane Wilson applied for an order to protect her property and earnings against her husband, James Wilson, on the ground of his having habitually failed to provide her with proper mamti n mce. Mr Joynt appeared for the complainant, and Mr McConnell for the defendant. The proceedings were brought under the Married Woman’s Protection Act, 1870, npon two grounds, namely, cruelty and neglecting to maintain his wife. Mr McConnell took a preliminary objection under the Act of 1860, by which two complaints could not be laid in one information. His Worship did not consider the objection a valid one. Mr McConnell then took another objection under the *3rd section of the Justices of the Peace Act, that an order of the Court had been made dismissing the case upon its merit s, Mr Joy nt having replied, his Worship said ho could not see how the certificate of dismissal affected the case. Mr Joynt called Mrs Jane Wilson, who deposed that she had been married twenty-one years to the defendant, but separated from him last September. He had act ed towards her with systematic cruelty. She left him because she had received nothing from him for the previous three months. He drove a knife at her once, and had used violence to her on many other occasions. He wa» worse when he was sober that when he was drunk, Defendant kept his own money and made complainant keep him. When defendant left she had £9O, which ahe placed in the Bank. She had possessed some proptrty, which she mortgaged in January, 1876, for £2OO, which defendant squandered. The mortgage was paid off in January of the present year. She was deriving no benefit from the property, her husband receiving the rents and living in one of the houses. Her children supported her by their earnings, [Mr McConnell handed in a certificate of title of the contested property in question.] After a lengthened cross-examination with a view of showing the circumstances under which the complainant left the defendant, his previous conduct to her, and the division of the household property between them when they parted, the witness handed in a letter received from the defendant, the contents of which she alleged were an aggravation of the complaints she had laid against the defendant. The letter contained the epithets “sneak” and mean “skunk,” aa applied to the complainant. Mary Wilson, the eldest daughter of the complainant and defendant, gave corroborative testimony at to the cruelty of the latter to her mother before tho separation took place. Tho complainant was latterly supported by tho earnings of herself and her brother. Elizabeth Wilson, sister of the lost witness, being called, gave similar evidence. [Loft sitting J