TOTALISATOR ODDS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 3668, 21 July 1927, Page 4

TOTALISATOR ODDS.

maximum FINE IMPOSED. AUCKLAND, July 19. Joseph George Rees, aged 52, was fined by Mr McKean, S.M., the maximum of £2O on each of two charges of laying totalisator odds on the result of the Wellington races. On two further charges of laying totalisator odds the magistrate reserved his decision. On the charges of carrying on business as a bookmaker no evidence was offered. .

Constable Belton, a recent arrival in Auckland, gave evidence of having made bets with the accused in the Criterion Hotel. He stated that on one of these accused paid him 29s lor 10s invested on Banjuke. Detective Sergeant O’Brien, who arrested the accused, said that he found on Rees one £5 note, thirteen £1 notes, eleven 10s notes, and twentyone half-crowns. Mr Skelton, counsel for the accused, said that his client would deny taking bets from a policeman. He was a stationer and a book found in his overcoat merely noted business transactions. Many of these were loans. One entry was: “Police, five pounds.” This, said Mr Skelton, was a policeman who did not want his name put down in case the book might be lost. ltees was pressed to give the name of the constable. At first he positively refused, but eventually he wrote the name on a piece of paper for the Magistrate and the Chief Detective. The accused, who admitted that he had been convicted previously of four offences under the Gaming Act, said that since he was fined £4OO he had discontinued business as a bookmaker.