GAMING HOUSE CHARGE
Titled Woman On Trial
(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, March 18.
The prosecutor in a Mayfair society gambling case played—and lost—a demonstration game of chemin-de-fer with an expert at London Sessions Court today. With the approval of the Court, the chairman, Mr Sebag Shaw, and the expert, a West End restaurateur, Mr Maurice Pommerand, demonstrated for the jury trying three well-known members of London society for alleged gambling offences under a 100-year-old law. Mr Pommerand said he had been a croupier in a number of French casinos.
Before the Court were John Aspinall, aged 31, of Chelsea, his mother, Lady Mary Grace Osborne —wife of the baronet and racehorse owner, Sir George Osborne and John Richard Burke, aged 34, also of Chelsea. All pleaded not guilty to gaming summonses and had elected to go for trial before a jury at an earlier hearing. Aspinall was charged with assisting in conducting gambling and his mother was charged with permitting a room in Hyde Park street to be used for gambling. The charges related to a police raid on a West End flat at 12.45 a.m. on January 10. The police raid took place a few hours after a Rolls Royce had arrived drawing a trailer full of equipment for a chemin-de-fer party, the Court was told. Lady Osborne had said when the police entered the house: “Anybody would think we are a crowd of criminals. Why don’t you catch some real criminals, there are plenty,” according to police evidence.
The case was- adjourned until tomorrow.
Permanent link to this item
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19580320.2.169
Bibliographic details
Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28540, 20 March 1958, Page 16
Word Count
256GAMING HOUSE CHARGE Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28540, 20 March 1958, Page 16
Using This Item
Stuff Ltd is the copyright owner for the Press. You can reproduce in-copyright material from this newspaper for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0 New Zealand licence. This newspaper is not available for commercial use without the consent of Stuff Ltd. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this newspaper, please refer to the Copyright guide.
Acknowledgements
This newspaper was digitised in partnership with Christchurch City Libraries.