CURIOUS LIBEL ACTION.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVI, Issue 6, 7 June 1913, Page 5

CURIOUS LIBEL ACTION.

■ "»! V A NEWSPAPER FALLS IN. Per Press Association. Wanganui, Last Night. The Supreme Court to-day heard the libel action Albert Stuhbs v. Wanganui Chronicle, claim for £5Ol for alleged libel contained in a reference to a case mentioned among others in the historical allusions to an article describing the alterations to the local courthouse. The evidence showed that the reporter understood that the oases cited referred to court incidents long past, and with which all persons connected had passed away, and, further, that the information as to the particulars of the case was accurate. The libel was contained in the words "A publican who did to death r.:i old Maori who used to dress in woman's clothes.'' It transpired that the person referred to was Stuhbs, who kept the hotel 27 years ago. The Maori was a peculiar character, supposed to be a hermaphrodite, and was drinking in the hotel when a row occurred, in the course of which Stuhbs knocked the Maori down, and afterwards threw him A day or two afterwards the Maori died, and subsequently after the coroner's inquirq, Stuhbs was, on information of one of the deceased's friends, charged with manslaughter, but the magistrate dismissed the case on the ground of a conflict of evidence, as to the degree of force used. On the discovery of the mistake, the Chronicle tendered an apology and offered £SO, hut the case went to trial. The jury, i>y a three-fourths' majority, awarded £IOO, for which amount judgment was entered, with costs according to scale.