AN HOTEL AFFRAY.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 5208, 25 November 1927, Page 4

AN HOTEL AFFRAY.

SHOTS, THEN A RUSH FOR COVER.

WOUNDED MAN SILENT.

In a shooting affray in the public bar of the Castlereagh Hotel, at the corner cf Park and Castlereagh streets, Sydney, James O’Neill was badly xvounded. The man who attacked him is still at large.

A mysterious aspect of the affair is O’Neill’s refusal to tall the police anything.

At 5 p.m. nearly 30 men were drinking in the island bar. O’Neill was with another man, when a third walked up to them. He seemed to be greatly agitated.

“I’ve got a gun here, and I’m going to shoot', somebody,” he cried. “Only rats carry guns,” O’Neill replied.

At that the man fired point blank at O’Neill, the bullet hitting him in the head. He vaulted over the bar, counter and tried to hide behind' the cash desk in the centre.

Peter Smith was sitting at the desk. The man leaned over the counter and fired two more shots at O’Neill, who was crouching as low as possible. One hit him in the left, eye, the other in the left hand.

Men drinking at the bar “took cover” wherever they could. Some threw themselves flat on the floor. The man with the revolver ran. from the hotel, and is said to have boarded a Bondi tram.

O’Neill staggered from the hotel, smothered in blood. He was attended to by several men, and eventually taken to Sydney Hospital by the Central Ambulance.

He refused to give information to Detective-Sergeants Thornley, Bowie, and Rowe, and Detectives Baker and Caiman.

He was taken- to St. Vincent’s Hospital. Although his condition is not critical, it is thought that he will lose the sight of his left eye.