TOLD THE MAGISTRATE

Hokitika Guardian, 13 January 1928, Page 1

TOLD THE MAGISTRATE

LONDON, Nov. 20. Awakened in a common lodging-house by a detective at half-past twelve yesterday morning, Joseph Du Klerk, a crippled linguist, took a hypodermic syringe and a tube of morphine tablets from under the mattress. The syringe and the tablets were his own property, but the needle in the syringe was identified by a doctor as one fitted to his own syringe which he had lost together with a tube containing strychnine found in Du Klerk’s waistcoast pocket. Speaking from the dock at Bow-street Police Court, Du Klerk, who said lie was a British subject of French extraction, asserted that lie picked up the tube of strychnine outside the surgery, and in an eloquent speech he declared that by will-power he had cut down Jiis supply' of morphine one-half during the last six months. The drug had become necessary', he said, when his leg was amputated more than a year ago, and he had obtained supplies from a chemist on a doctor’s certificate.

The suggestion of tile police was that Du Klerk, who was known as a drug addict, had stolen the syringe, tablets and strychnine when left alone in the surgery, and Mr Fry, the magistrate, accepting this theory, remanded the crippled linguist for inquiries as lie had drugs in his possession about which the police were curious. »****»

Alice, a married woman, after leaving her husband in Euston-road, was arrested for insulting behaviour. Two constables swore that she caught by the arm a man who said he had never seen her before; hut Alice asserted that she knew him well and that lie was going to see her home. The magistrate said he was not satisfied that there had been an offence, and discharged Alice, whose tears were quickly changed to smiles. * * * * *

Violet, arrested in the Strand on a similar charge, complained bitterly that she could not set foot in the Strand without being locked up.

•• Eight times they have had me in the last few months,” she wailed, “and I had just had a cup of coffee at a stall when the officer said, ‘ Come along. Violet, you are going to Bow-street with me.’ I’m sick of going to BoWstreet ! ” She paid the usual -IDs. James Jones, who is also well known at Bow-street, had got mixed up with the queue waiting outside the Winter Garden Theatre. He pleaded that he had just come out of the hospital and, feeling weak, took something to revive him. “Jt was a wonderful revival,” he said reflectively. “ I was overcome so quickly that I found myself in Rowstreet when I thought I was in Drurylnne.” lie will have no difficulty in findine his healings during the next lew days.

Dress material was being moved from one building to another ill the neighbourhood of Covent Garden, and John, a casual workman, moved £2 worth ol material down several streets and then hid behind boxes in Covent Garden Market, where he was found by a regular employee who followed that material as a hound trails a scent. John, who said he had been working and drinking since eight o clock the pterions night, was remanded tor sentence.

Charles sober is a very dill’ercnt prison from Charles drunk. Charles drunk can’t stop talking, and unless he has someone to talk" to ho is unhappy, hut not so unhappy as the people with whom he talks.

On Tuesday night he stood at an omnibus stop and talked to waiting passengers until in self-defence they formed an anti-Charles Society and handed him over to a policeman, who was glad to get rid of him to an inspector, who hastily shut him up in a cell.

Charles sober does not talk at all. His fatal fluency had entirely disappeared yesterday morning, when he answered questions by nodding or shaking his head. ***** ■•The. rank is but the guinea stamp; The man’s the gowd for a’ that ! ” wrote “Bobbie” Burns. But, according to Detective-Inspector Coles, giving evidence at Old-street Police Court yesterday, Harry, the big bricklayer, had upset the moral by making false dies to impress base metal with an 18-carat stamp of gold. Neither the stamp nor the gold was real, declared the inspector, who further remarked that he had found two revolvers of a foreign pattern and a dagger made in Sheffield in the home ot Harry the bricklayer in C’liftou-street, t'inshury. The suggestion of the police was that 5 bangles, 8 bracelets, 22 rings. 2 neckchains, 4 watches, and 11 watch-chains made of cheap metal had been stamped ns gold by forged dies. An unusual charge, 1 suggested to several detectives m the court. “Not at all,” they replied; “quite a common trick in Shoreditch.” Harry, who said lie always worked on his own' and that his wife knew nothing of his business, was remanded by Mr Sharpe, the magistrate. « * * * *

Should racing greyhounds be kept m a backward? Residents in Bucklandstreet,' Shoreditch, sav emphatically that greyhounds should he confined to the wide open spaces, and some of them employed a solicitor to apply for a summons against the owner of a dozen greyhounds, which, they complained, kept them awake at night. A fortnight ago the owner or keeper of the dogs objected to his neighbours using abusive language towards the dogs, language, he contended, that could he construed as threats to poison the animals.

A summons was yesterday granted against the keeper of the dogs, who was said to he secretary of the North London Greyhound Racing Association, and both grievances will be beard as one.

The submission of the complaining residents of Ruckland-strcet was that if these racing dogs were allowed to bark the electrical hare would he “ barracked ” out of business.

AVilliam Pharo, a man of leisure, owes his downfall to a temporary fascination for work. For a long time lie, his wife, and three children had lived on the charity of the ratepayers, drawing I9s in money, 19s in food, and a hundredweight of coal weekly from the Shoreditch guardians to the amount of £92.

Then, in a weak moment, AYilliam yielded to temptation and got a job at £1 12s 6d a week, hut he continued to draw his out-relief from the guardians, otherwise the ratepayers. “ You are one of those lazy people who burden English industry and make it hard for the country to carry, on,” said Mr Sharpe. as He_sen| William to do hard labour for a month.

If "William had resisted the temptation to work lie would now be a free, man. AVorlc is the curse of the doledrawing classes. John, a young, able-bodied man, earning £4 a week, objected to paying os a week towards the support of his mother because he urged that his invalided father, who had a pension of £2 a week, was well able to look after his own wife. “ A'ou will pay 6s a week,” ordered the magistrate, who did not seem to realise that mothers are out of date. “ Her young-mnn-that-was molests my sister,” declared a practical matron, who looked as if she had no illusions about love. “ Very' well,” sighed the magistrate, “ i will send an officer to inform him that he is not wanted.” Sarah is a had girl. She is only 17, hut she is the terror of a Salvation Army- Home, where she had been placed on probation after being convicted of theft. “ She writes dreadful things on the walls,” said the woman missionary, “and she is corrupting all the young girls in the place with terrible stories.” Sarah was remanded in custody and warned that anything she wrote in the cell would he used as evidence against her.