A CHINESE GAME.

Taranaki Daily News, 20 June 1922, Page 5

A CHINESE GAME.

WELLINGTON PAKAPOO SCHOOL.” CONVICTION IN LOWER COURT. UNUSUAL GROUNDS OF APPEAL. By Telegraph.—Press Association. Wellington, Last Night. Appeals were made to the Supreme Court, before the Chief Justice and Mr. Justice Hooking, to-day, against the convictions and fines imposed by Mr. Hunt, S.M, against six Chinamen —Ah Lym, Yee Fon, Sing Tong, Loo Toe, Young Suey and Git Ton —who were charged under the Gaming Act, on the information of Detective T. E. Holmes, with having been concerned, in February, in the play or conduct of what the police style a pakapoo house, in Haining Street. Young Suey and Git Ton were each fined £lOO, and the other four each £5. The main difficulty which confronted the police in the Lower Court was that no Chinaman or other person able to read the characters in the bundles of unused tickets or on a few marked tickets could he persuaded to come forward and give evidence as to meanings of the idiograms. When requests to Chinese, not only in Wellington but in other centres, were all refused, the police endeavored to secure the evidence of a missionary, who had gained expert knowledge of Chinese writing during a period of service in the East, but she, too, declined to give evidence as to the significance of the characters. The magistrate overruled counsel for the defence (Mr. Jellicoe) in his 'contention that that evidence was essential before convictions could be recorded, and imposed the fines stated above. Mr. Jellicoe at once gave notice to appeal on all cases. The appeal of Ah Lym was first considered. Until the police had proved that the premises, No. 7 Haining Street, were used as a common gaming-house, said counsel for the appellants, those persons found in the place were not called upon to explain their presence there. Beyond the arrest of the appellants at the house, there was no ground for the evidence laid before the magistrate. Nothing seized on the premises was proved to be such as brought the premises within the wording of the- charge. Two sets of “documents printed in a foreign language” were stated by the magistrate to be pakapoo tickets, but upon that point no admissible evidence was placed before him. Counsel opposing the appeal relied on the following points: (1) That the magistrate found as a fact that the tickets found in the possession of the appellants were pakapoo tickets, and that his judgment could not be interfered with unless the appellants could show that there was no evidence to go to the jury ujfcon the point, while if there was such evidence, the magistrate’s decision must be upheld; (2) that Section 7 of The Gaming Act, 1908, made the finding of tickets in possession of two of the four appellants evidence that the house was a common gaming-house, unless the contrary could be proved; (3) that the appellants did not prove that they were in the house for any lawful purpose; (4) to prove that the tickets were pakapoo tickets, it was not necessary to call expert witnesses to prove that tickets were made out in Chinese characters; (5) that where an unalwful game was Statutebarred, the method of playing it was common knowledge. The court reserved its decision upon the first four cases and proceeded with *the consideration of the appeals of Git Ton and Young Suey.