POLICE COURT.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 3780, 4 January 1908, Page 3

POLICE COURT.

1 ' At the local Police Court this morning before Messrs Alf. Fraser and A. Cockburn , J’s.P., Herbert J» S. Metford was charged with ,va_grancy by the police. , Accused, ;who is a stranger to the town, and looked very disruptable, pleaded not. guilty. He made a statement to the effect that he had arrived at Foxton during Christmas week and bad been working at the mills ! and he y said he was a hard-working man. Constable Woods stated that the man had been wandering around the town begging and entering private premises and sleeping in the Park, and residents’ outhouses. He wandered into the Post Office Hotel at 2 a.m. one morning and was found iu a bedroom there and ejected. He had &Iso been cadging beer at the pubs and was subsequently arrested in the Avenue at 6.30 this morning. A. D. Cleraett gave evidence as to meeting accused who asked for a shilling. Accused had a few minutes previously walked into Mrs Whyte’s residence but nothing had been stolen. Accused was not quite sober. A. E. Shadbolt, licensee of the Manawatu Hotel, said he didn’t think accused was in his proper senses. He had visited the hotel and asked for whisky and soda. He-had also drained beer casks standing in the yard into a bucket and 1 had taken the latter utensil away. He also stole a bottle of beer off the bar counter.

Accused : I’ll swear I didn’t.

Mr Shadbolt: I took it from under your coat. Accused: Oh lor, what’s the matter. I must be mad.

Constable Dickson deposed that people had complained about accused wandering on their premises begging, and using threatening language. Accused entered Andreson’s bouse, and turned into the owner’s bed, and entered several other houses.

Mr Towser stated that 'accused last- night entered the cottage of an old lady who lived alone in Thynne St., and demanded money. He informed the police.

Constable Woods said the man was a nuisance to the public and should be sent out of the town.

Asked whether he had anything to say, accused replied: “I’m just going mad; I’ve been drinking. I’ve never stole anything in my life. ’ ’ He had work to go to at Palmerston.

In reply to the police the accused said he had been convicted of drunkenness and detained for medical examination at Palmerston.

The ; Bench convicted accused and sentenced him to a month’s imprisonment in Wanganui gaol.