RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT.

Kumara Times, Issue 1070, 5 March 1880, Page 3

RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT.

•¥'- ■ TSursßay,' 4th March. {Before J. Mackay, Esq.-, ItLm.-, and E. Barff, Esq., J.P.j breach op the municipal 'corporations act. Louis Seebeck Was, charged,, oh the information of the police, with keeping a public place of amusement, 16 Wit a billiard saloon, in Seddon street, Ktimhra, the same not being duly licensed, Contrary to the Municipal Corporations Act abd the bye-laws of the borough of Kumara. ' Mr Warner apphafred for ttys 'defeq-; daht and , Sergeant Etohiereon.. conducted the case , oh behalf’ of the Police. . ■ Constable jSTasb, on being swfirn, deposed: I know the defendant. He keeps a billiard saloon in Sed’don Street. ,On the 14th Of February last I visited his premises betWeeh.half-past nibs and twelve o’clbbk at night. There was a hhmber of pefrsbhs in the robin playing billiards. The room was ‘open to the pbblic as fir hft I knoW, as people were going in and out as they wished. The first time I went in 1 was not refused admission. After, t asked the defendant if he had a license, he said some* thing about a club, and he said he would show me .‘the rules, which he did before 12 o’clock that.night. To Mr Warner: He did state explicitly that it was a club room. He did hot, to my knowledge, say that I had no right there. I went outside With him, but 1 do not remember him saying that I was to leave, as the rooln Wag private. James Wylde, oh bbing swOrn, deposed :. I am Town Clerk of the tbrohgh of Kumara. . T know the defendant. . He has no license for a billiard iho’m in the borough. I have applied to him to. take bne out, but he has al-ways-refuged. Hesaid it was not usual to take out a license in other parts of thebblony. I produce the Bye-laws of the Borough. . To" Mr Warner r I cautioned the defendant last about hiS license on the 7tn ofoPebruaryv ,; ... To the Bench : A resolution of the Bereugh Council had been passed rela-'tiv’e-to the licensing of billiard rooms, abd that was the reafioh I spoke to defendant about it, William Close, on being' sworb, deposed.cl know, the defendant. I was in his billiard saloon on February 14th. I was playing billiards. lam a mem rber of the Kunrata Billiard Club. I Was a member four d'ays before that date. I believe it was formed ihtb a ’club about a month ago, Alexander Murphy, on being swprn, deposed : I am a member of the Club, t was ft .member on■ the 14th February, When I was playing there. I had then been a member about three or four days. The defendant asked me to beOonVe a member of the club, but he gavo ihe tto reason why he wished me to joih. The subscription is one shilling per annum and I pay for the table When I play, although J am a member. Thomas Green, on being sworn, deposed : I was in defendant’s saloon on the 14th of February last, placing billiards. I ahi a member of the club Uucl was before that date. The defendant told me he was going to form it into, a club-room, as he said he wanted fb make it private and keep the loafers bttt; I paid one shilling for my subscription as a member of the club for twelve months, and 1 pay a shilling a game besides when I play, I cannot say hoiv many members there are *inthe club. Mr Warner thought the time of the Court might be saved as the prosecution had not proved by evidence the toost essential point in their case—the existence of the Borough, and on these g r ou(Ar, he asked the case might be Tne Bench , overuled the objections, as they considered the production of the bye-laws was sutheient evidence of the fact of Kumara being a borough. % Mr Warner contended that by” seetion 342 of thd Municipal Corporation Act the .bye-laws could not be received, as thEy were not under the common Seal of the borough-.

The Bench ruled that under the section'quoted by Mr Warner of the Act the bye-laws of the Borough were admissible, unless Mr Warner could prove that it was not the common seal of the borough which was attached to thdse bye-laws. Mr Warner asked the Bend\ jbp take ia note of his objection “ that there was ho proof of the existence of a Corpbration, Mr Warner said that as the Bench had overuled that point he woilild tike two other objections. Firstly, that under the 323rd clause of the Municipial Corporations Act of 1876, a billiard room was never contemplated tb dome Under the clausb ] and, secondly, that the room was not used on the day or date alleged in the information as a public billiird thorn. There was nothing to show, in the 'clause referred to, that billiards came under the terih of arauEeinent. In England there was, a special act for licensing billiard rooms, Tender the l3th ’scnedilie of the Municipial Cor-poration-Act, 1867, all places of amusement had to be registered, and yet billiard rooms did not come under this Act. The Act never contemplated this, but meant that nutiibers of people assembled together fot amusement, aU the context of the clause clearly shewed. He would ask the Bench if they thought that a blliard room was to have all the conditihbS attached 1 6 it which applied to large places of amuseinent such as water in case of fire special means of - exit and various l other things provided for in the Act. Jf the Bench gaVe judgment against his client in this case, then the owner of every billiard ropro.lu town would have to take out a license, and his client would ttjke especial care that Such was the cade. On ihe-date named in the information the room was a club-room, and t not a public billiard room, and he asked the Bench on these grounds to dismiss the case. The Bench were of opinion that thfi billiard room of defendant wds a plabe of public amusement under the Act} but as. the evidence was insufficient to support the charge on the occasion complained of in the information-, the case would be dismissed.