RAID ON WINE

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 668, 21 May 1929, Page 1

RAID ON WINE

YOUTHS' ESCAPADE AT SWANSON FINES OF £3 IMPOSED Incensed at the absence of the man they had come several miles to see, Gordon Freeman and Donald Charles Morey broke into a wine store on the premises at Swanson and, after selecting a satisfactory vintage, filled six bottles which they took away with them. PREEMAN and Morey were charged at the Police Court this morning with breaking and entering the warehouse of Marko Buljan at Swanson on May 11 and stealing six bottles of wine valued at £1 10s. Mr. Bryce Hart appeared for the two youths and suggested that after the evidence had been heard the magistrate might reduce the charge to common theft. Marko Buljan, a wine-maker of Swanson, said that he had arranged for Freeman, whom he knew’ as a motor mechanic, to come and tow his car to the city. Eventually he had driven off himself, starting on Saturday and arriving back on Sunday morning. Witness had then found his wine store broken open and a quantity of wine missing. A jar holding two and ahalf gallons and a barrel holding two gallons. had been tanipered with, but it was impossible to tell exactly how much wine had been taken. In answer to Mr. Hart, witness said that he had promised Freeman 12 bottles of wine for towing his car in. He had always been fairly free with his wine at the garage where Freeman had been working. Mr. F. K. Hunt, S.M., then agreed to reduce the charge to theft and Mr. Hart entered a plea of not guilty. The police produced statements made by the boys, in which they admitted taking six bottles of wine which they had syphoned off from the barrel and the jar in the shed. In the opinion of Mr. Hart the boys had acted foolishly. Freeman was annoyed because he had wanted the wine for a party that night and thought at the time that he had a right to it. He now recognised tlia he was wrong and was sorry. Both boys lived with their parents. Chief-Detective Hammond: I would ask that they be kept under some restraint.

The magistrate: They need not think they are going to get away without any punishment. Both boys were fined £3 in default 14 days’ imprisonment. They were given two days in which to find the money.