MAGISTRATE’S COURT

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23751, 24 September 1942, Page 6

MAGISTRATE’S COURT

WEDNESDAY (Before Mr F. F. Reid, S.M.) THEFT OF ROLLER SKATES

Pearl Enid Shannon, aged 24, pleaded guilty to the theft of a pair of roller skates valued at £1 10s, the property of Arthur L. Power. Senior-Detective H. Nuttall said the accused hired the skates at a rink, took them home, and sold them for 15s to a second-hand dealer. She was fined £2 with costs, and ordered to make restitution.

FAILED TO SEND CHILD TO SCHOOL Thomas Arthur Johnston, a carpenter, was charged with failing to enrol a child for school. „, ~ _ Mr J. G. Brown, for the Education Department, said that in four and a half years the child had attended 12 schools, and with many absence.; and loss of time before enrolling at each new school, had attained only Standard 1. Johnston was fined 20s, with costs. PRICE ORDER CASES

Hubert Addis and Florence A. Frew (Mr C. S. Thomas) pleaded guilty to charges of selling chocolate at a price not conforming with that fixed by a Price Order, and with not displaying prominently in the shop a copy of the order or a statement of prices. Mr A. W. Brown, for the Department of Industries and Commerce, said the chocolates were sold for 2s a half-pound box instead of Is 10id. The breach was caused by Ignorance, said Mr Thomas. For years 2s had been the standard price for these chocolates, and the defendants continued selling them at that price in ignorance of the price fixed.

The regulations provided for a fine of £IOO, said the Magistrate. The circumstances of the case did not appear serious, and the fixed prices In the main aimed to prevent profiteering. Mrs Frew, the manager of the shop, was fined 10s, with costs, on the first charge, and convicted and ordered to pay costs on the second. Addis was convicted and ordered to pay his share of the costs on each charge. Lawrence Beauvais and Winnie, Elizabeth, and Monica Madden (the last three trading as the Strand Tea Rooms) were also charged with selling chocolates in excess of the fixed price. Beauvais and Winnie Madden were each fined 10s, with costs, and the other defendants were each convicted and discharged. The Canterbury Drug Company, Ltd. (Mr G. G. Lockwood), pleaded guilty to selling phenobarbitone, aspirin, and feed-ing-bottle teats at other than the fixed prices. Mr Lockwood said the firm was formed as a buying and distributing agency by the chemists, and it was its policy, where possible, to sell below the other wholesale houses. It had overlooked that these houses might have received permission from the Price Tribunal to Increase their prices in conformity with increases in landed costs.

The firm was fined 20s, with costs, on each charge.