LAW REPORTS.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1194, 1 August 1911, Page 3

LAW REPORTS.

C6URT OF APPEAL, NATIVE CASE. A QUESTION OF PRACTICE. A dispute over Native land occupied tho attention of tbo Court of Appeal during tho greater part of yesterday. On the bench were Sir Joshua Williams and Justices Edwards, Chapman, and Sim. Tho parties to tho case were Patccna Kerehi and others, plaintiffs, and Taitunia Jlaragatana and others, defendants. Mr. Martin Chapman, K.C., with him Mr. S. A. Atkinson, appeared for tho plaintiffs, and .Mr. J. L. Stout, with him Mr. H. 11. Evans, for the defendants. It was set out as follows:— That some 82,760 acres of land in tho laupo districts had been subdivided by tho Native Land Court at tho instance of the well-known chief To lieu lieu, who_ had named the hapus entitled. No objectors had appeared when challenged, and the Court had ordered certificates of title to be issued in favour of the hapus named, on certified plans being deposited in the Native Land Court office. After some time the owners of a subdivision (Okahukura No. 2) had complained that their block contained only 79G acres, instead of 23G0 acres as stated in the original plan. On their making application to the Native Land Court for redress, the application had been granted, and thereupon other Natives whoso land had been added to tho block had made complaint to tho Court. The result has been protracted litigation extending:, over the last eight or ten years. In the. later stages of tho action judgment -had been given for plaintiffs on Starch 17 last, and perfected on March 24, from which date the defendants had had four months within which to appeal. They had lodged ' notice of appeal on July 10, but tho registrar had fixed, as security for costs, a. greater sum than they thought right, and they had appealed to the Supreme Court against that decision. The learned , Judge had dismissed the appeal, and the defendants had then given notice of appeal against this decision, and then against the original decision of March 24. This question, came before the Court of Appeal yesterday, by way of an application by the- plaintiffs (Pateena Kerehi and others) to have the notice of motion set asido on. the ground that the practice prescribed by the Court had not been followed. . Their Honours held that the defendants (Taituma Mnrangatana and others) had abandoned the lirst notice of appeal (in reference to costs) by giving the second notice of appeal in regard to the judgment of March last. It was also held that there could bo no appeal from the Court of first instance on such a matter as t.ho determination of the amount of security for ..costs. It was, however, still open to the defendants to appeal on tho main question which had been decided by the. judgment of March.