ASSAULT CHARGE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 9 August 1938, Page 9

ASSAULT CHARGE

SEQUEL TO PARTY. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) NEW PLYMOUTH, Aug. 8. “The kitchen was in wild disorder, with a broken gramophone and crockery strewn over the floor.” This was the way in which the Crown Prosecutor described the condition of a house at Fraser Road, Hawera, on the night of June 15, when the police arrived to investigate a complaint that a member of a party of guests had been struck on the head with a piece of wood by the man in whose house the party was held. The sequel was the commencement in the Supreme Court at New Plymouth before Mr Justice Blair, of the trial of Walter Thomas Rosewarne on a charge of assaulting a Maori, Charlie Tumoana, so as to cause actual bodily harm and, alternatively, with common assault. Witnesses described the scene in the room, stating that after much drinking there was a general “mix-up.” One alleged that Tumoana threatened Rosewarne with a chair, and it was suggested that Rosewarne went out, pulled a batten off a fence, and struck Tumoana on the head. The Maori was in hospital three weeks. The Crown Prosecutor was permitted to treat a girl witness, aged 15, as hostile, because she contradicted statements made to the police and in the Lower Court. A police witness said he found a broken batten in the room.

The case for the prosecution was completed tonight, and the defence will be heard tomorrow.