MID-DAY RAID.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 205, 29 August 1936, Page 13

MID-DAY RAID.

CITY GAMING HOUSE.

FIFTY-ONE MEN CHARGED.

KEEPERS FINED £20 EACH.

Arrested in yesterday's mid-day raid on premises in the Excelsior Building, Customs Street, 51 men appeared before Mr. Wyvern Wilson, S.M., in the Police Court late yesterday afternoon. Fortysix, charged with being found in a common gaming house, were each fined £1 and costs, while three others who had been previously convicted under the Gaming Act, were each fined £2 and cost?.

Gyles Edmund Fairbrother, aged 38, butcher, and James Morton McGill, aged 33. a labourer, were charged with using the premises as a common gaming house.

Senior Detective Hall, who prosecuted, produced dice, playing cards and some pakapoo tickets which had been found on the premises, _ which were known as the Civic Social Club. The club, he said, was specially fitted up for gaining, and had been open about a month. When the detectives burst in the door Detective-Sergeant McHugh saw McGill, who was in a smaller room. McGill admitted that he was one of the occupiers of the place. He added, "We are well caught." He also said that if the police had come a little earlier they would have caught about 20 more men, as one player had won £20 and had gone out to a hotel with these men. He also said he had "always given the boys a fair go," none of the dice being loaded, as the police could see.

Appearing for McGill and Fairbrother, Mr. Stuart said the "school" was only a small one, where games were played for 0d and 1/. McGill and Fairbrother had. been out of work for some time, and were at present on sustenance. The rooms were mostly frequented by sustenance, men, and the premises were used as a social club where the men could have their lunch. There were electric kettles and other facilities for making tea.

"These two men are said to be on sustenance," said Mr. Wyvern Wilson. "Most of their clients are also on sustenance. They are able-bodied men who could do country work. There are columns of advertisements in the newspapers concerning position on farms, but these men prefer to hang round and take each other down."

Remarking that if McGill and Fairbrother were on sustenance they could not very well pay fines, the magistrate, in fining each £20 and costs, fixed the alternative in each case at one month's imprisonment.