CLAIM FOR DAMAGES

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 115, 19 May 1925, Page 8

CLAIM FOR DAMAGES

AGAINST TOILET EXPERTS

SUPREME COURT ACTION AT

AUCKLAND.

(BY TELEGRAPH.—PRESS ASSOCIATION.)

AUCKLAND, This Day.

At the Supreme Court, Mrs. Lilian Thomas, a boarding-house keeper, claimed £629 damages from Maud Hanna and Marie Antoinette Stewart, trading as toilet experts under the name of "Miss M'Elwain," for injuries alleged to have been received through the treatment of her hair with some deleterious substance, or in an unskilful, negligent, or improper manner, as a result of which she was afflicted with sores and suffered great pain and her general health wa3 injuriously affected. The defence denied the use of any deleterious substance and denied unskilful treatment.

Plaintiff gave evidence that after the treatment her hair began .to fall out. One morning her nose was half-way across her eyes, and her ears were three times their normal size and turning purple. The scalp was swollen. The sores were all discharging. The second week her eyesight was affected, and her hair had to be cut off close to the scalp. The disease spread to other parts of her body. Her eyelids and lips cracked.' Finally she consulted a doctor. '

Cross-examined, witness said that about eighteen, months previously she used a certain preparation on the top of' her head. She did not know the smell of henna. .

Two, doctors gave evidence as to plaintiff's sufferings. They stated that a test with two preparations was made en plaintiff's arm. The first produced no irritation. The second, which plaintiff had used previously, caused severe inflammation.

For the defence Mr.. Quartley said plaintiff had to prove she got poisoning, and that she got it from defendants' treatment. A lady assistant would say she.gave the treatment for which plaintiff asked, that she used a clean new brush. Ho suggested it was Possible that sulphur in tho preparation asked for was the cause of the trouble. Evidence as to the use of a perfectly clean brush was given.