BRIBERY ALLEGATIONS

Auckland Star, Volume LII, Issue 280, 24 November 1921, Page 5

BRIBERY ALLEGATIONS

ALDERMAN SENT TO TRIAL. SYDNEY, November 23, R. D. Brainstem, an alderman of the Sydney City Council, who is charged with having accepted a bribe as an inducement to favour certain individuals in relation to contracts for supplies of wood blocks to the City Council, was committed to-day for trial. Counsel for the defence, addressing the Court, claimed that there was not a scintilla of evidence to warrant sending defendant for trial. If the evidence -was correct the men behind the proscctvtion were not a bit better than the n:«an charged, and were guilty of the grosser crime of attempting to seduce Bramston to commit a crime. There was no evidence to ehoiv that Bramston had taken a bribe. Tha evidence v.-n that up to the point where the trap was laid for Bramston he was a clean man. Counsel scoffed at the idea, which he described as ridiculous, that Bramston should have taken men he had never seen before to bis heart and fallen into a trap like a poor, silly fool. After severely criticising tli3 evidence of witnesses who allegedly offered a bribe, counsel declared that they were parties to a conspiracy, and were engaged in a most despicable transaction. The magistrate found a priiryi facie case against Erameton. who pleaded not guilty, and reserved his defence. Hβ was committed for trial, bail being fixed at £SO.— (A. and N.Z. Cable.)