WIRELESS USED ON RACECOURSE

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21686, 21 January 1936, Page 9

WIRELESS USED ON RACECOURSE

FOUR MEN FSNED ACT'ILLEGAL IN LIGHT OF HIGH COURT JUDGMENT SYDNEY, January 20. A .sequel to the discovery of a portable wireless transmitting set on a man at Rosehill racecourse at a meeting last year was the conviction in the police court of Rufus Theodore Naylor. aged 52, an investor, and Charles Rowles, aged 26, a radio mechanic, Bertie Sheeley, aged 47, a clerk, and Walter Bedford, aged 25, a mechanic. The cases had, been adjourned pending the recent High Court judgment on the validity of the Wireless Telegraph Act. Bedford was fined £5 with £7 15s costs for having, without authorisation, used an appliance for transmitting messages by wireless. Naylor, Rowles, and Sheeley were charged with having been concerned in Bedford's offence. Naylor was fined £5 and Sheeley and Rowles £2 each. All three were ordered to pay £2 10s court costs. On a similar charge Eric Gordon, aged 32, pleaded not guilty and was remanded. The prosecution stated that Bedford, who had a transmitting set strapped to his body, sent information from the racecourse to a spot outside, where there was a receiving set and a broadcasting set belonging to the radio station 2KY. The defence stated that defendants had good grounds for believing that they were acting within their rights, but after the High Court's decision they had come to court at the earliest opportunity to plead guilty.