A HARD CASE.

Tuapeka Times, Volume I, Issue 45, 19 December 1868, Page 3

A HARD CASE.

(To the Editor of the Tuapeka Times.) Sib, — I venture to intrude on your, valuable space owing to the importance' of the matter I intend bringing far- - ward. We hear a great deal about liberty, &c, but apparently it is- but a- - phrase, and our boasted freedom but tile charm of a dream. A notable instance of this recently occurred in our" vicinity. Mr. McCarthy, a storekeeper here, was lately fined £20 for selling ■ whiskey without a license. Now, without entering into the question of the propriety of a license systemj I hold, this case to be one of great hardship and injustice. Owing to the summons being taken out on the 3rd ult., and ee.rved on the 7th inst., no ■ time was given for Mr. M'Carthy fa • prepare his defence- Police Constable" Cruikshank, who prosecuted, only brought forward one witness, and his evidence was not, I think, sufficient for a conviction. He had paid nothing for the whiskey ; and although he made some statement about meaning" to pay Mr. M'Carthy at some futureperiod, we are surely not to make a person responsible for another man's intentions. Another point in the evidence was almost enough to have stopped the proceedings, viz., the discrepancy between the statements as to who served the grog ; yet, in spite of all this, Warden Wood refuses to re-* mand the case in order to give Mr. M'Carthy time to bring his witnesses forward, and finad him £20Now, sir, I appeal to your readers* whether this, law though it may be, i» not something very like injustice. If? seems to me a very great hardship indeed that a respectable and worthy member of the community can be dragged up in this way, and punished. - for the awful offence of' shouting form's friends. If the police paid more attention to serious^crimes, they would find that their time is too valuable to be spent in getting up trifling bui annoying prosecutions. — I am, &c./ Fiat Justuxl Mount Bonger, Dec. 14.