MINT VENDING MACHINES

Evening Star, Issue 21231, 12 October 1932, Page 4

MINT VENDING MACHINES

FGUND TO BE GAMES OF CHANGE [Pet* United Press Association.] AUCKLAND, October 11. Whether the mint vending or “ fruit ” machines which have been operated in several tobacconists’ shops in Auckland are games of chance, and whether the premises in which they are operated may be termed common gaming houses were questions argued by counsel before Mr F. K. Hunt, S.M., in the Police Court to-day, when Eric Phillip Goldsboro, aged a tobacconist, was charged that, being occupier of a shop in Newmarket, ho kept the premises as a common gaming house. The prosecution contended that success in obtaining sweets from the machines was luck and not skill, while the defence contended that skill was necessary. “ I am told that so much money is involved in these machines that the matter will be taken to the Supremo Court whatever my decision is,” said the magistrate. “ Similar cases have been twice before the courts in Now Zealand, and on both occasions the magistrates have considered the ma-

chines games of chance. I have heard the evidence and seen the machines, and I have seen the so-called experts using the machines, and 1 am satisfied they are games of chance.” The defendant was fined I Os, security for appeal being 1