CHARGE OF THEFT WITHDRAWN

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 16, 13 October 1927, Page 10

CHARGE OF THEFT WITHDRAWN

CASE AGAINST A BOROUGH COUNCILLOR BY Telegraph.—Press association. Blenheim, October 12. At the Magistrate’s Court to-day, Mr. T. E. Maunsell, S.M., heard a charge of theft of sheep runners against John Joseph O’Halloran. At the conclusion of the hearing, Mr. A. C. Nathan, who appeared for informant, adopted a suggestion from His Worship and withdrew the information on the butcher’s giving an assurance that there would be no repetition of the offence, and on defendant agreeing to pay costs and to return the runners The same course was adopted in regard to charges of trespass preferred against Thomas Tracey, who was. acting under the butcher’s instructions in seizing the rnni"'rs. His Worsb. p warned the butchers that if there were any repetition of the offence he would have no hesitation in entering a conviction for theft.

' It was reported yesterday that as a sequel to a dispute between the master butchers of Blenheim and the local Borough Council in regard to the ownership of some sheep runners taken from the animals killed at the municipal abattoirs, which was recently the subject of a Supreme Court action in Wellington, in which the verdict went to the council, a party of butchers raided the abattoirs and, despite the warnings bv the manager, removed the runners As an upshot of this, information was laid against 1 J. O’Halloran, charging ■him with the theft of the runners O’Halloran is a local butcher, and also a member of the Borough Council and of the Abattoirs Committee.