GROG SHANTIES in NEW ZEALAND AND BETTING HOUSES IN LONDON.

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 108, 5 March 1870, Page 6

GROG SHANTIES in NEW ZEALAND AND BETTING HOUSES IN LONDON.

The following extract from the London " Sportsman " shows that the steps taken by the policemen (query, the Government) at home, against betting houses, are identically the same as those recentlyadopted by a policeman at Skippers, to secure a conviction against a sly-grog seller. Whether these steps are worthy of approval, we leave our reiders to judge :— Apropos of the recent conviction of Thomas Russell for keeping a house for betting purposes, a correspondent writes us as follows : Sir, — In the report of proceeding in to-day's paper against Thomas Russell for keeping a betting house, I observe that a miserable informer, named Wm. Boyle, detective, deposed that " to make sure of the place being a betting house, he made a little book of his own, and laid against some horses," and that "Mr. Superintendent Draper found money for him to bet." Can no proceedings be taken against these men for aiding and assisting in the practice of betting ! -Yours, &c, . J. H. A. The remarks of our correspondent are to • the point. It certainly does seem strange that detectives should be allowed to participate in a breach of the law in order to obtain a conviction . Of course, both Mr. Superintendent Draper and the man Boyle were equally guilty with Russell in breaking the Betting Act, but we suppose that the doctrine that the " end justifies the means " is upheld by police authorities. Supposing, however, this argument holds good, what is to prevent policemen from mixing themselves up with suspected or professional thieves or housebreakers, and, after urging and assisting them to commit crimes, reveal themselves to their dupes in their true colours, and catch them red-handed in the game? We suspect that the British public would not stand such proceedings long, and yet this is exactly what has been done by the police in nearly all the betting prosecutions that have recently taken place. Is the country, or at least the metropolis, so free from crime " that the police must needs go about wasting the public time and the public money in obtaining convictions against men who, at least, break no social law 1 The suppression of betting houses was a just and wholesome measure, but we cannot believe that our legislators ever intended the Act to be applied in the manner it has been of late by the Scotland-yard authorities, and least of all that a system of espionage should be inaugurated which is almost without parallel.