JUDGMENT SUMMONS

Press, Volume C, Issue 29434, 9 February 1961, Page 9

JUDGMENT SUMMONS

Debtor Ordered To Pay

An order that Dennis Rodney Clarke, newspaper reporter, of Palmerston North, pay a judgment debt totalling £472 in instalments of £3 a week after a cash payment of £5O on or before February 15 was made by Mr Justice Macarthur in the Supreme Court yesterday.

The judgment summons against Clarke was brought by Stephen Richard Hales, Mr R. J. de Goldi appeared for Hales, and Mr B. McClelland for Clarke.

Mr de Goldi said that judgment against Clarke in the sum of £350 by way of damages was given in the Supreme Court on August 18. last, in a petition by Hales for dissolution of marriage on the ground of his wife’s adultery. Party costs amounted to £122.

Counsel said he sought an order in the present hearing, under the Imprisonment for Debt Limitations Act, 1908, that Clarke, as judgment debtor, be imprisoned for nonpayment of this debt at the time it was pronounced or, alternatively, for a Court order under section H of the act varying the judgment so that Clarke could pay by instalments Debtor’s Offer Mr McClelland called Clarke to give evidence of his financial status and he was crossexamined by Mr de Goldi. Clarke said that he was now married to the respondent in the petition for divorce. They had one child and another was expected shortly. To Mr de Goldi he said he did not know there had been no answer to Hales’s solicitors’ demand for payment of the debt. Clarke said he understood his solicitors had been negotiating a settlement A claim by his wife for equity in the joint family home belonging to her and Hales was still unresolved.

Clarke said he could pay £5 a week for a year in full settlement of the judgment debt, the balance being settled in lieu of his wife’s claim in the joint family home or, alternatively, pay the full judgment debt at between £2 and £3 a week.

After submissions by counsel, his Honour said that there was insufficient evidence to show that Clarke could or should have paid the £422 since the time of judgment, August 18, last, and therefore counsel could not reasonably ask for Clarke’s imprisonment.

However, said his Honour, he thought the evidence disclosed it to be a proper case for the Court to make an order varying the judgment so Clarke could pay by instalments.

In making the order, his Honour ordered Clarke to pay £5 5s costs plus disbursements on the hearing of the judgment summons.