SPECIAL TELEGRAMS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1133, 5 December 1879, Page 2

SPECIAL TELEGRAMS.

(fJiOU OL'K OWN COKKK.SI'ON'DENTS.) CHRISTCHURCH. Decepiber 5. Kichard Davis, Deputy-Registrar of the Supreme Court, appeared before the Resident Magistrate's Court to-day to answer live informations to the following effect: —That, without lawful excuse, he

did file declarations under the Debtors anil Creditors Act, IS7O, the documents not being stamped as required by the Stamp Fee Act-, 1875, and regulations of the Governor in Council published in the New Zealand Government Gazette No. 74 24th December, 1874. Mr. Cowlishaw prosecuted on behalf of the AuditorGeneral. He stated that durint: November the attention of •.Mr. J. E. Fitzgerald was drawin to the fact that a large quantity of documents werfe unstamped. Mr. Davis said tliat jhe w - as".over-w-orked, v that. the matter was one of oversight, and offered to stamp all the unstamped, dogbmenfe. ITo had been,,, offered a .chance of resignation by the Government, but had refused, and courted an investigation. The Bench said that it was absolutely impossible that the stamps could have become ..jlet'afched from 401 documents. -'There was not a shadow of doubt as to the judgment being given against defendant, and a"penalty imposed. There had been systematic neglect in not stamping documents, and gross misappropriation of money. Although he could not be prosecuted on technical grounds, there was not the slightest doubt of moral crime. TIM ARIL December 5. John Gibson, farmer, to-day kicked John King in the public street. King wont insolvent, owing Gibson LSOO for oats he had got to sell on commission, and for which he (King) had received L2OO in cash. The Magistrate, under the circumstances, fined the defendant in a mitigated penalty of 20.3.