A LIQUOR CASE.

Taihape Daily Times, 30 January 1919, Page 4

A LIQUOR CASE.

When seven charges of selling liquor without a license were preferred against J. T, Lees at T© Awamutu, Mr E. W. Burton, S.M., dismissed the informations. The case is interesting. It was shown that W. G. Abbott, licensee of the Commercial Hotel, assigned his estate to creditors in September of 1917, and conducted fixe hotel as agent for the trustees then appointed until in September last Lees was appointed to carry on the business of the hotel for the trustees. The sales complained of appear fo have taken place before the license was made over from Abbott to Lees, and while the two men were both at the hotel. The grounds for the prosecution- were that Lees had consigned liquor to the King Country, signing the notification book, “W. G. Abbott, per J. T. Lees.” The point raised was that the liquor belonged to Lees, who was not the licensee. The defence was that Abbott was a party to the sale, for Lees was simply acting in his stead; also, that the liquor sold could have belonged neither to Lees nor Abbott, for both had run the hotel, not for themselves, but for Abbott’s creditors.

The information w.as dismissed by the magistrate, who said he could not disassociate Lees and Abbott, as both were merely the agents o£ the trustees.