BRAWL AT WAIKINO.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIII, Issue 4383, 27 February 1922, Page 2

BRAWL AT WAIKINO.

YOUNG MEN BEFORE WAIHI COURT. PLEA OF SELF-DEFENCE. INFORMATIONS DISMISSED. Four young men, Sid. Fugill; W. P. Quintal, Patrick O’Grady, and liam O’Grady, were each charged at the. Magistrate’s Court* on Thursday, ’ stages the Telegraph, before Mr J. H. Salmon, S.M., witty having committed a breach of the peace at Waikino on December J. 6 last. v Mr J. L. Hanna, w,ho appeared for Quintal and Fugill, asked for an interpretation . of the word informant, and raised the point tfaatj in this case the information had been laid oh-> hearsay, and therefore was wrong in law. Senior-Sergeant O'Grady contended that the information was correct, and > that most of'the police cases brpugnt before the Court emanated from hearsay evidence. . . After some discussion the Magistrate gave it as Huis opinion that Mr Hanna's point could not be sustained, and; the hearing of the charges was then proceeded with. . AU four accused pleaded not guilty. Senior-Sergeanb O'Grady outlined the cases. The accused, he said, had engaged in, a general brawl at the. Waikino Public Hall on the occasion of a social on December 16 last. During the fighting William p’Grady had his arm broken. , Evidence called for the prosecution showed that three or four, men had been fighting at the Waikino HallOne witness deposed thjat while ne saw several men fighting on the road he could not, owing to the darkness, identify any of the four accused* in the Court. Written statements from Fugill an 1 Quintal were read by the police ad- 1 mitting that they had been inveigled into a fight, Fugill stating that ha had only acted in self-defence. Quintal on the other hand went to the assistance of his mate, wjho was being . attacked by several men. This closed the case for the prosecution; Mr Hanna said that as far as the O’Grady’s were concerned not, an . atom of evidence had been adduced to identify them with the case, and he would ask that the charges he di&« missed against his two clients. At this stage tl)e sergeant intimar- . ed that he had statements from the ' O’Grady’s made to the Paerpa police. Mr Hanna objected to their use on the grounds that ’ the cases for the prosecution had been closed. \ The Magistrate dismissed the '* charges against! _th e O’Grady’s, and after hearing the sworn evidence of Quintal and Fugill His Worship summed up briefly. He said that in the absence of evidence against the O’Grady’s, who no doubt were mixed up with Quintal and Fugill, and the failure on the part of witnesses to identify the accused, he could not see how a conviction could be recorded. It was a case of .the usual conspiracy of silence. “What'amazes me,”, remarked the Magistrate, "is the cowardice of those people who will not 1 tell what they saw.” The charges, against the accused (Quintal and Fugill) were then dis-t missed.