TOLD THE MAGISTRATE

Hokitika Guardian, 25 June 1927, Page 4

TOLD THE MAGISTRATE

LONDON, .May '2. Football finals, boat-race nights, and Derby days arc privileged occasions in the Most hnd. On these sporting anniversaries oui' excellent police are instructed to exorcise diplomacy, which moans that John Citizen is permitted to carry enthusiasm to extravagant limits so long as he does not unduly interlere with the prosaic calm of (hose ol us who, unfortunately, have ceased to thrill in re.sprin.se to a national achievement.

The West Knd being the playground of the people, it is a splendid testimony to our national' temperament that the charge list at the .Marlborough Street Police Court, which angles in the pools of pleasure, should yesterday contain little beyond the ordinary Monday morning catch. Certainly, as Mr i'.dgar Wallace

point- out. there were one or two cases that in their revelation of the obscure motives that animate the ordinary human being, which again means all of us, excelled in strangeness the most fertile plots ol the novelist, hut Mr Caucei'lor. the magistrate, had largely to deal only with the small indiscretions tliat may haunt anybody on a holiday.

The queer part about these indiscretion- is that nobody worries except the victim, and lie worries merely because he exaggerates his own importance. The man who in-i-t' on his virtue is not so vain as the man who magnifies his sills.

We will lake the ease of Phillip from Cardilf. a plump young Welshman who, celebrating the victory ot Cardilf City with more'enthusiasm than good manners. was ejected lrum the Criterion Restaurant, lie was annoyed been use he had lost his badge, and he went out side and told a policeman all about ij. The policeman merely smiled, so Phillip, who had teased to become a football enthusiast and hail degenerated into a conscientious citizen, took a taxicab to Vine Street Police Station and told the inspector all about it. The inspector merely smiled : and Phillip. wlio had forgotten till about W emble.v and was concerned only with the prejudices of his home town, buttonholed it constable and toi'd him all about it. And the constable, who was a supporter of the Arsenal, promptly took him hack to the inspector. Phillip, who was torn between pride of race and fear of the consequence, was discharged with a caution by a smiling magistrate who knows the difference between an episode and a habit.

Many people who had not been to Wembley shared in the West Knd revelry, and among them was Bridget, an old Irishwoman, who, sensing an extraordinary animation in the West Knd. heartily joined in the celebration, (treat was her joy when she learned that an English team had keen beaten, and because of her newly won enthusiasm for Cardilf she joyfully went to Marlborough Street, where she was discharged with a caution. “HniVhe.” she exclaimed fervently, "the Knglish did not win.”

Bessie, who used to live in Cardilf, needed a spree in which to celebrate the victory of her native city, so she went to Hyde Park, and there in silence and solitude drank the health of every member of tin* Cardilf team, and then solemnly -mashed an empty wliiskv bottle.

Pickpockets were busy in the West Knd on Saturday night, hut Ruby. a second-hand clothes dealer from Bow. indignantly denied that she had tried to go through the pockets of an inebriate kitchen porter who could remember nothing after lie bad left W emhlcy. Two plain-clothes policemen deci'ared that they bad watched Ruby take the kitchen porter round a corner in Frith street and go through his pockets, but the kitchen porter said lie had nothing there worth taking except Ik., which helped to pay hi.s line for having been drunk, and the magistrate hound over Ruby, who was wanted at Clorkemvell on a drunk and disorderly charge.

The Black Man’s ( In') in X<■ \v C'onipton Street gives trouble to the police, said a constable, on account of obstruction by coloured men loitering outside

the premises. Gerald, a young limn of colour and consequence, told a policeman to go a place where hi'ack complexions are supposed to be the rule, and the unsolicited advice cost him 10s. :: * * x

Victims of the dancing craze multiply almost with the fre<|Heiicy of adapted jazz "melodies.” Alice, a girl of 19, skimpily clothed, but profusely powdered. a typically daiicing-mad girl and the typo becoming only too common in the police courts, admitted that she had stolen a coat from an office which she had entered on a false pretext. •She is already on probation for simplifting at -Uarylebono and slio was remanded for further inquiries. Nowadays there are more young people dancing themselves to the devil than ever drank themselves to gaol.

Two youths employed in a West End hotel were accused of stealing a rug. One hoy, carefully removing a piece of chewing gum from his mouth, and fixing it inside the lapel of his coat, confessed the theft. The other hoy protested his innocence. Then there was a real schoolboy row in the dock, and a. stand-up fight was only prevented bv botli young being remanded. ******

A spirited and not undignified appeal was made from the dock by Edward Horace Abrahams, a young fish saTeslnnn, who, together with Esther Spero. was charged with stabbing Elizabeth Bennett in the face and neck with a knife.

The girl Spero insisted that if there had been an offence she alone was to blame, because Abrahams was not present at the time; hut the police objected to Abrahams having bail on tho ground that he was " a dangerous man.” Abrahams rightfully urged that whatever his past convictions may have boon they had nothing to do with the present charge. “That is English justice.” he claimed. Mr Canceller agreed and granted hail.

“ This is the. first time 1 have ever made a fool of myself." declared William, who had sought to drown his sorrow over the defeat of the Arsenal. And everybody in court stared at the human phenomenon, who paid 10s for slipping from the superiority of the superman. LONDON. May 7. Owing to the fairness and impartiality of a Scotland Yard detective, Air Booth, the. magistrate at Lambeth Police Court yesterday, did what I have never known a metropolitan magistrate do before—he reversed his decision to convict a man for being in unlawful possession of stolen lend. On tho evidence Mr Booth’s original decision was ]>erfeotly justified. The accused workman was stopped bv two plain-clothes officers carrying a sack containing 541 b of lead info a marine dealer’s shop. Questioned, the workman admitted that hei lhad taken the lead from his employers without permission, and the magistrate was hound to convict. But when testimony about character was demanded a C'.T.D. detective, with the eloquence of a defending counsel. . turned what looked like a felony into something like a farce. He announced that the workman had J

an excellent record in the Navy, boro an irreproachable character, and tho lead in his sack was the accumulation of years picked up hit by hit in the way of ‘‘perks’’ on different jobs. The mail’s wife, protesting against lilting the sack when she was spring cleaning, requested her husband to clear it out of tho house, and he was only obeying domestic orders when he was arrested. “This detective is my idea of what ;i police officer should he,” remarked Mr Booth as lie discharged the man with the sack, “and after his fair and impartial statement I have no hesitation in eating my own words.” The workman owed his arrest entirely to his unsatisfactory answers; it was only through the persistent- inquiries of the detective that the real facts were disclosed.

Three charges that call for exceptional tact and astuteness from the plain-clothes policemen, who are really detectives in training, are ••unlawful possession,” “a suspected person “loitering with intent to commit a felony.” and “insulting words and behaviour.” In the first rase an overzealous officer runs the risk of arresting a respectable artisan; in the second lie may ho moved by knowledge of the suspect’s criminal history to see all offence where none was contemplated ; and in the third the officer might think more of his offended dignity than of a breach of the I a w.

Particularly must an officer he careful when in pursuit of a suspected por.-on, for this is the only charge wherein a mail's past may be brought up against him before conviction. Most cf our metropolitan magistrates «arel’ully sift tho evidence in these cases, and rightly so, for there is tho prevailing risk of the dog and the had name. Mr Roath invariably acts a- coun-

sel for the defence in charges ol insulting words and behaviour, as many an unhappy constable in the witness box at, Lambeth Police Court has found to It is discomfort. W’c bad such a case yesterday when two young clerks, Leonard and Norman. were arrested hv a. young Scottish constable for insulting behaviour in the New Kent’ road.

The officer’s complaint was that the two clerks, pretending to he drunk, were walking arm-in-arm. and staggering across the pavement. He requested them to behave respectably, and they complied by taking a taxicab, then after paying the driver, changed their minds and took cups ol codec at a coffee-stall. Proceeding along his heat, the constable beard Leonard address two girls as “Dearies.” whereupon they retorted “What a cheek! Who do you think we are?”

“Was il resentment or merely coy ness?” inquired Mr Booth.

Tlic Scottish constable, obviously unversed in the subtleties ol the sweeter sex. was not sure, hut he admitted that if the two clerks hail not spoken to the girls he would not have arrested them.

Leonard, who had made the glad advance, was hound over, and Norman. who was ton shy to be insulting was discharged. Leonard and Norman picked the wrong polic email, or, us Mr Rootb put it earlier in the day. “very seldom does the prosecution and the defence look with the same pair ol spectacles on tin; same lacks.

Another t unstable was gently chaffed by the magistrate in the case ol (•’eorgo Henry, who, to use a racing term, had been “humping and boring” under a heavy alcoholic impost. “He was doing it real,” said the const.able. “A Scottish reel?” blandly inquired Mr Booth. “No, he was doing it on purpose,’ declared the constable. “I was seedy and f only had two drinks,” protested George Henry. “Ho looked seedy with drink,” infist“il the constable. George Henry, who is a railway servant, had nnu It money in his pocket , and tho magistrate relieved him ot I's in the hope that the fine would improve his health aad keep him front bumping and boring.

Husbands and wives have queer and ingenious ways of annoying each other when the domestic atmosphere is troubled, but a spirited young wife told the court something new in the nay of reprisals. “Because 1 wanted to go to work my husband took my jewellery away from me, so I took away his, and then ho hit me,” she said. “You don’t need jewellery for your work.” remarked the magistrate.

“No, listen.” snapped the spirited wife, stamping her foot.

“1 am listening,” replied Air Booth patiently.

“AVoll, I wanted my jewellery to pay for my piano lessons. T)o you understand ?

“Perfectly,” observed the magistrate. “You have a talk with the woman missionary."

“Af.v husband won’t wash at home; bo washes in tho pigeon-house across the street,” complained another worried wife.

“I see. Ho bathes with the pigeons,” remarked Air Booth. “Yes. And lie is always going into publicbouses and dances in other people’s houses. He was all right before ho wont to France, but since the war ho has been awful. He dances with a, woman across tho street, and— ’ “I see,” said tho magistrate. “It is tho other woman who worries you. You, too, had better see the missionary before you take a summons and wash vonr dirty linen in court.”

"But he will wash in the pigeonhouse.” wailed the wife.

“A strange preference truly.’ murmured Air Booth, "but not evidence of cruelty—unless it is to the pigeons."