"TWO MONTHS HARD."

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 97, 26 April 1922, Page 6

"TWO MONTHS HARD."

GAOL FOR WOMAN BEATE&. MAX THREATENS MURDER. A woman-beater, who went bere«k ■because he was awakened too late ioget to an hotel for a few final potations before six o'clock, pleaded self-defence when charged at the Police Court thia mornin 2 with having assaulted Emilr O'Brien and Eleanor Dyer. Evidence wae given that the accused, Mark Tuite, a young man, had been lying down in a house in Federal Street or Monday, after having muddled himself with drink. Before he went to sleep, he instructed the woman O'Brien to awaken him in time to go to the nearest hotel before the closing hour. This she fa:l«4 to do, and when Tuite awoke, ver*— thirsty, at about 6.15 p-m., and reaKeei that he would have to go dry until tie morning, he apparently became frantic, and set about attacking the woman with a chair. The woman Dyer came to th» rescue, and, aecordin e to her evidence this morning. Tuite locked the door of the room and .set upon her. "He got mc by the.throat, pushed mT teeth out. and kicked mc on the shins, saying, 'I'll murder you,'" declared this witness. "He said 'You won't get ont of the house alive.' 'Oh!' I called out; 'you'll kill me!' 'That is what lam going to do,' he cried, and he would ■have, only a man came and looked through the window when he had mc bendinz back over the table choking mc. The man fetched the police, and when they came Tuite ran away and hid among- some blackberry bushes at the back." Senior-Sergeant Rawle: Did you girt any cause for this assault? Witness: So help mc God I don't know why the man did it. He went for iMrs. O'Brien because she failed to wakehim in time to go to the pub before it closed. Accused: Didn't you hit mc on tie head with a slais dish? Witness: Xo; Mr O'Brien hit yon on the head with a bottle of stout to defend herself. You sairl you had a gun and threatened to use it. ' Accused: Xevcr in my life. Mrs. O'Brien had one and your husband pinched it, or O'Brien did. A neighbour said he heard the row ne\l door, and. looking through the window, saw the accused assaulting Mrs. O'Bren and heard him •threatening murder. It wasn't the first timp. either. Accused that ivhat he had done we merely in self-defence. Senior-Sergeant Rawle stated that Tuite had been before the Court previously for drunkenness and theft. There had been previous trouble, too. iriiii him and the woman O'Brien and the woman's husband. Tuite was sentenced to a month's imprisonment, with hard labonr, on J each charge.