BIT HIS EAR

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 110, 31 December 1931, Page 6

BIT HIS EAR

SAILOR BECAME ANNOYED AND PAID FOR IT IN COURT AN UNUSUAL CASE Making himself objectionable at a city dance on Wednesday evening a Palmerston North resident and an ex-sailor, aged 27 years, when warned that he would have to leave the hall if he continued to misbehave himself, took matters into his own nands. He assaulted two men who approached him on the matter, burying his teeth in the ear of one of them. The sequel was • heard in the Palmerston North Magistrate's Court, when the offender, whose name was ordered to be suppressed, appeared before Messrs. W. G. Ashworth and J. T. Bosworth, J's.P., charged with assaulting Clifford Jennings and William Smith by striking them with his clenched fist. Accused pleaded guilty on both counts. Senior-Sergeant Whitehouse, in outlining the case for the police, contended that too much liquor was the reason for the disturhance by accused at the dance in the Municipal Hall. When spolcen to by Smith, the exsailor hit him, but readily apologised for this mistake. Subsequently accused had been cautioned by Jennings for his bad behaviour in the hall, and he then struck the official on the cheek with his clenched fist. Later he had fastened his teeth in Jennings' ear, "leaving marlcs on it which will be carried for some time to come." The senior-sergeant pointed out that accused had been dismissed from the Navy when he had been brought before a Naval Court for a similar offence. "It was his birthday on Wednesday and he eelebrated it," said counsel. "He assures me he has no recollection of the incidents." Accused came of a respectable Palmerston North family and he was now prepared to take out a prohibition order against himself. The Bench convicted and discharged accused on condition that he take out the order and pay £1 witnesses' expenses, while a request by counsel for the suppression of his name was also agreed to.