RESISTED ARREST

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 11, 14 January 1928, Page 9

RESISTED ARREST

YOUNG MAN FINED William Howard Morris, a young man employed as a carpenter, appeared before Messrs. T. Potts and J. Kerr, J.P.'s. at the Petone Court this morning charged with drunkenness, using obscene language, and obstructing a policeman in the execution of his duty. Morris pleaded not guilty to all three charges. Constable Scarry stated that at midnight last night he spoke to several young men —of whom the accused was one—who were evidently under the influence of liquor and were acting in a disorderly manner in Buick street. About twenty .minutes later he came across the same party singing and calling out in an obscene fashion on the Esplanade. He advised them to go home, and all except Morris did so. The accused spoke abusively and wanted to fight. He closed with the constable, Who threw him and then handcuffed him, and took him to the police station. Morris admitted that he had been one of the party mentioned, but he claimed that Constable Scarry had previously taken a personal dislike to him and on this occasion had rushed at him and tried to throw him. When he resisted the constable struck him across the mouth with a pair of handcuffs, cutting his lip and breaking the plate of his false teeth. With a blow on the back of the neck the constable had then knocked him unconscious. Morris, who had previously been convicted for being drunk in charge of a motor-car, was fined £3 for being drunk and resisting the police, and £2 for using obscene language. Ho was allowed a month to pay.