APPEAL BY HOTEL LICENSEE

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23361, 21 June 1941, Page 12

APPEAL BY HOTEL LICENSEE

■ -• ’ MAGISTRATE’S DECISION QUESTIONED

(P.A.) WELLINGTON, June 20. The Court of Appeal to-day continued the case in which a hotel licensee, Andrew Dick Reid Duncan, is applying for. a writ, of certiorari quashing his recent conviction by the magistrate (Mr J. H. Luxford). Mr C, H. Weston, K.C., for the Crown, submitted that sections 79 and 80 of the Justices of • the Peace Act, 1927, gave the Magistrate power to substitute a different offence for the offence charged, providing the accused Was not thereby prejudiced. An accused, he said, must be told of the new charge against him. He must be given an .opportunity of stating his defence to.it, and he must not be prejudiced by any departure from the formalities - of' -a set , trial. In the lower courts, such as the Magistrate’s Court, certain formalities may be waived so long as the -three fundamentals above-mentioned were retained, To see that the accused was hot prejudiced og embarassed. was the concern of the tribunal.

In this case,' in the Magistrate’s Court certain usual formalities had been waived by Duncan, but all the necessary fundamentals had been observed. Therefore the writ of certiorari sought by Duncan should be refused. , The court reserved its decision.