ATTACKED DETECTIVE

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 669, 22 May 1929, Page 1

ATTACKED DETECTIVE

JEWELLER FINED £5 SCUFFLE OUTSIDE COURT An attack on a detective outside the Magistrate’s Court yesterday resulted in the appearance of Sydney Rhodes Speight in the Police Court on a charge of assault. TYETECTIVE O’SULLIVAN, the as■K-' saulted man, was struck on the face and scratched. His clothing was also torn and damaged. Constable Buckley, Court orderly, went to the detective’s assistance, and Speight was arrested. Later in the day he was charged with assaulting Detective O’Sullivan and with committing mischief by damaging his clothing to the extent of 10s 6d. Chief-Detectivo Hammond reminded the Court that Speight, who was a watchmaker and jeweller aged 38, had appeared in the morning, when he liad applied for variation of a maintenance order made against him in respect of his wife. The Court had not granted the variation. After the hearing Detective O’Sullivan had been speaking to Mrs. Speight on police business, vlien accused had attacked him. Mr. J. F. AV. Dickson, on behalf of Speight, admitted the assault, but urged that his client had not known Mr. O’Sullivan was a detective. Counsel considered that the order was preying on the man’s mind as his business was not paying too well. Taking into account the fact that Speight had been under considerable nervous strain, Mr. F. H. Levien, S M., fined him £5 for assault. On the second charge he was ordered to make good the damage. “Had the officer been in uniform I would have taken a much more seri- ' ous view of the case,” added the magistrate.