BOTH PROHIBITED

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 45, 16 May 1927, Page 12

BOTH PROHIBITED

MAN ASSAULTS HIS WIFE DRUNKEN FAMILY BRAWL A pale, tired-eyed woman climbed wearily into the witness box at the Police Court this morning. Her hat concealed a gash in her forehead that her husband had given her. A few yards away, in the dock, stood Robert William King, of Devonport, charged with assaulting his wife. Mrs. King’s story was that her husband had come home drunk about 2 p.m. on Saturday and about 4 o’clock sent her out for more beer. Having consumed that, “he turned nasty with me,” she said. “I went out of his way into the boy’s bedroom. He kicked me off the bed and I was walking out the door when he kicked me again. I fell with my head against the dressingtable and cut my head. The doctor had to stitch up the wound.” “He was very good while his order was in force,” she told Mr. F. K. Hunt, S.M., in answer to a question. Senior-Sergeant Edwards said that King had been in the cable ship Iris and the captain had told him on a previous occasion that he would be put off if there was any more trouble. “He’s probably lost his job,” said Mr. Edwards. ‘‘Serve him right,” was the magistrate’s comment. “My wife came home the worse of drink, ’ said King from the dock, just to show that he was not the only one at fault. Mr. Hunt recalled Mrs. King and put a fair proposition to her. “If you take out a prohibition order against yourself I won’t send your husband to gaol.” She didn’t want him to go to gaol. King was therefore convicted and ordered to come up for sentence if called on, on condition that both he and his wife took out orders against themselves. King had also to pay 10s witnesses’ expenses in addition to the doctor’s fee.