CAUSTIC MAGISTRATE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 28, 3 February 1932, Page 7

CAUSTIC MAGISTRATE.

PEER IN BORROWED CLOTHES. LONDON, January 28. Lord Langford, the Auckland-born peer, -who lias been ordered to pay liis wife, Lady Langford, a London waitress, £2 a week maintenance, was severely criticised by the presiding magistrate. Mr. M. Turner Samuels, counsel for Lady Langford, asked permission to call as a witness a man who, he said, saw Lord Langford, well-dressed, accompanied by two fashionably-dressed women, go to the box office of the Albert Hall, apparently to buy concert tickets. The magistrate, Mr. H. C. A. Bingley, said that counsel need not trouble, as he intended making the order. Mr. Bingley referred to Lord Langford's promises of money to his wife, repeated ad nauseam, but unfulfilled. "Neither his evidence nor his letters have impressed me more than apparently they impressed his wife," said the magistrate. He emphasised that when Lord Langford knew that his wife was expecting a baby, he did not write a word of sympathy, hope or encouragement. When the baby died, he did not commiserate with her. "His appearance in borrowed clothes struck me as theatrical," he said. "Working men appearing in Court do not borrow clothes. On the contrary, they are not represented by two eminent counsel." Lord Langford's counsel interposed that his client's clothes had been seized for rent. Mr. Bingley: I am not satisfied that Lord Langford. could not have supported his wife, and not satisfied that he cannot support her now. Lord Langford, who did not attend, was ordered to pay 15 guineas costs.