RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 280, 18 July 1874, Page 2

RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT

Thuesd at, July 16th. (Before H. A. Stratford, Esq., EM.) Police v. Thomas Pinder.—Keeping open his licensed house, the, Empire Hotel, after 10 p.m. Defendant pleaded guilty, and urged, in extenuation that there had been an Oddfellows-Lodge held' in his house that night, and that the persons found in the hotel belonged to the Lodge Committee. Pined in the mitigated penalty-of 55., Court costs ss. 6d. Police v. Edmund Horswell. —Por allowing gambling in his house on the "evening of the 4th inst. Mr. Rowlatt, for the defence, .urged three objections; Ist. That it had not been shown by the evidence, that the defendant had any knowledge of the transaction ; 2nd. That there was no proof that the house was licensed. He also objected to the SubInspector being allowed to prosecute, as he; was,-not the informant. The Magistrate said that he would take twenty-four hours to consider the last, and would at once overrule the other,objections,' as the burden of the denial of statements set forth rested in the defendant. Thomas Mewton and Robert Paisley were examined for the prosecution, and gave evidence, as to a raffie with dice. After hearing tlie evidence of these witnesses the defendant pleaded that the raffle was for a work of art—a model ship, and on behalf of a destitute man with a. sickly wife in the hospital, in Dunedin, and the funds were to'be devoted in paying the. man's expenses to join his wife. It was a work of charity, and he had nothing to gain by it. In summing up, the Magistrate said that such a raffle might probably have been made legal by a written application to his Honor the Superintendent; arid, although it was but a trivial case, it would have been more graceful on the part of the defendant to have admitted the breach of the Ordinance, with explanation jnst given, and have thus saved the trouble and expense of bringing three witnesses to prove it. A penalty- of ss. would meet the merits of the case. Three witnesses were .allowed ss. each, T and 4s. mileage. Mary Cudden v. Robert Keenan.—■ Suit for £l9. Mr. Bailey for the plaintiff. Mr. Rowlatt for the defendant. Defendant pleaded not indebted, and put in a set off of £22 ss. Three witnesses were examined for the plaintiff, and three for the defence. After hearing the evidence, the Magistrate summed as follows: —lt appears that the defendant, Keenan, sent home to Ireland four emigration tickets, and a request to his siater, Susan Keenan, to come herself; or, if she could not, to send out four girls to New Zealand. His sister could not come, but sent out four girls, consigned to his care—they being cousins to one another, and nieces to defendant. They arrived in the Lady Jocelyn, and were brought to Naseby in Poole's coach, at Keenan's expense—he i having sent the money to Dunedin for that purpose. The plaintiff had proved that she had been in the service of the defendant for twenty-two weeks, and for seven weeks of that time with extra duties imposed upon her, owing to the absence of Mrs. Keenan in Melbourne. The witness, Bridget Jackson, stated that she had received 15s. a week from the defendant since the ; date of her arrival, aizd the Court considered that the plaintiff had proved herself to be worth the same consideration, and would be allowed 15s. a week for fif "een weeks, and £1 a week during the . i e r en weeks Mrs. Keenan was absent. The counter account, or set-off, would be allowed to the amount of £6 17s. J 6d.; and, as the plaintiff had already received £5 from the defendant, she would I be entitled, after deducting the set-off al- ! lowed, to the sum of £6 6s. 6d, Judg--1 ment accordingly: with Court costs, £1 4s.—reach party to pay their own witnesses. - ■ .

Janet Watson v. John Barrett—Suit for £l7 12s. Defendant did not appear. Janet Watson, the plaintiff, having been sworn, stated that in December last she had been sent to Dunedin gaol for three months, and had left her clothes in the care of Mrs. Barrett, the wife of the defendant. That when she (the plaintiff) returned to Nasehy, Mrs. Barrett was gone, and had taken the clothes with her, and would not give them up. The Bench informed her that she had adopted a wrong course in suing for debt for "property detained, and dismissed the case, but without charges for hearing and order.