TWO MEN FINED

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 150, 21 December 1929, Page 8

TWO MEN FINED

BOTTLE OF MILK STOLEI

The actions of two men, John Pretoria M'Kenzie, aged 28, and John Patrick George M'Coll, aged 34, in Harper street just before 8 o'clock this morning aroused the suspicions of a City Council milk roundsman. He communicated with the police, with the result that the two men were arrested a little later by Constable Chapman, and appeared before Mr. T. B. M'Neil, S.M., in the Magistrate's Court ■on a charge of having stolen a bottle of milk.

M'Kenzio and M'Coll denied the theft, but after hearing the evidence of the milk roundsman and the constable, the Magistrate decided to convict the accused.

M' Coll; who gave evidence, maintained that ho was innocent. He ad* niitted to Senior-Sergeant Ward that he and M'Kenzie were jointly charged with theft in August last, and were fined £5 each.

Senior-Sergeant Ward said that the theft of. milk bottles was a very serious matter. If a customer disputed that milk had been left, there was only the roundsman's word to go upon, and in some cases roundsmen had to make good missing bottles or tokens. Thefts of milk tokens in the Harper street locality were frequent. The accused were fined £3 each, in. default 14 days' imprisonment, and each was ordered to pay'ss toward* witness's expenses. They were allowed until Monday to pay the money.