BROKEN INSULATORS

Dominion, Volume 26, Issue 124, 18 February 1933, Page 6

BROKEN INSULATORS

Two Men Convicted

POLICE CASES YESTERDAY

Two relief workers, Frederick McComish and Clifford Henry Wilton, who were employed on a job at Johnsonville on December 14 last, were charged in the Police Court yesterday before Mr. E. Page, S.M., with having broken 29 telegraphic wire insulators valued at £2/10/-. It was alleged by police witnesses that the two accused and one other man, who had been separated by some distance from the main gang, had thrown the stones which had broken a number of the insulators. The magistrate decided that the charge had'been established, and he convicted both men and ordered them to pay costs and make good the damage. Charges of negligently riding a bicycle, and of having no warning tell, were preferred against Clarence A. Hardyment, who pleaded not guilty to the first and guilty to the second. Hardyment had been riding down Adelaide Road and. had run into a six-year-old boy. The magistrate thought it clear from the evidence that the bicycle had been negligently ridden. He convicted. Hardyment and ordered him to pay costs on one of the charges and 8/- witness’s expenses. When the penalty bad been imposed, the court and police learned for the first time that Hardyment had broken his leg. The magistrate allowed him a month in which to find the money.

“This old man seems to be a victim of circumstances,” said Sub-Inspector Martin, when August Henry Metz, described as a bricklayer, pleaded guilty to being idle and disorderly in that he had been in Mercer Street for the purpose of begging alms. According to Ihe Sub-Ins]>ector, Metz was an unnaturalised German, aged 67. He was not eligible for an old-age pension, and had been begging for money to pay for his bed. The magistrate remanded Metz until Tuesday next, so that the police might make efforts to have him placed in an old men’s home. For attempting to cross the railway line in a motor-vehicle at Ngaio when the track was not clear, Walter Aplin, who pleaded guilty, was convicted and ordered to pay costs. Mr. C. EvansScott, who prosecuted, said that the front of Aplin’s truck had struck the front of the engine, and the truck had been severely damaged. A breach of her prohibition order resulted in Sylvia Shaw being fined 10/and costs.