USED INDECENT LANGUAGE

Press, Volume C, Issue 29582, 3 August 1961, Page 17

USED INDECENT LANGUAGE

Bu/» Passenger Fined £2 For using indecent language in a public place, on August 1. Samuel Robert William Greig Smith. aged 65, a workman, of Christchurch, was fined £2 and £1 10s in costs when he appeared before Messrs W. H. Sarney and H. C. B. Withell. Justices of the Peace, in the Magistrate’s Court at Ashburton yesterday Smith pleaded guilty to the charge. At 4.30 p m.. Smith, a passenger on a New Zealand Railways Road Service bus. travelling between Christchurch and Ashburton, used the language referred to in the charge while the bus was at Burnham. Senior Sergeant J. Devlin said. A number of women and children were leaving the bus at the time. Senior Sergeant Devlin said it was not a bad case, but some of the women had complained, and the defendant had been arrested when the bus arrived at Ashburton. In evidence. Smith said he was an alcoholic, and drink was a disease with him. He was a married man, and had raised a family, and respected women and children. His language in front of them was normally good. He had been drinking, and had spoken unconsciously while asleep, when he committed the offence. When he awoke, some four miles south of Bumham. there was hardly anyone on the bus.