WOMAN BANKRUPT

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 December 1937, Page 4

WOMAN BANKRUPT

“WANTED CASE TO PRACTICE ON.’

SYDNEY, November 25. An echo of the test case against the Commonwealth broadcasting legis. tion was heard by the Registrar in Bankruptcy (Mr. K ,eeney) when Mrs. Dulcie Jean Williams, 27, whose estate was sequestrated for a debt of £164, representing her costs in an unsuccessful appeal to Hig i Court against a line of £1 with »/ costs for using an unlicensed Wireless 'set, said that the appeal had been instituted by a solicitor after she had signed a' document which she did not .understand. She also said that she had been told that “they wanted to practise on a case, and they took mine,’ and that 'there would be nothing to pay. Mrs. Williams, who lives in Victoria Street, Darlinghurst, said that she was away from her home when the summons for using the unlicensed set was delivered, and she had never seen it. The summons had been taken by her “landlord to the solicitor, and the police court and High Court proceedings had been carried on in her absence. In reply to Mr. A. R. Taylor (of the Crown Solicitor’s Office), for the Official Receiver, Mrs. Williams said that when she returned from a holiday in Newcastle to her flat in Bourke Street, Darlinghurst, her landlord, Mr. Morgan, told her of the .summons, and said that he had taken it to a Mr. Williams, a solicitor. She. had not attended a police court or High Court in connection with the summons.

Mr. Morgan had told her when the hearing was to take place, but said that she need not go near it. “NOTHING TO PAY.” She added That she had never seen the solicitor, until he wrote her asking her to go to his office. During that visit, she said, she had asked him if she had anything to pay, and he said, “no.”

Later she moved to a flat in Dowling Street, she said. Williams and Morgan came one night and put a paper on the table, and asked her to sign it. “Mr. Morgan said, ‘Sign it, there is nothing in it. He just wants to go to the High Court,”’ said bankrupt. “I signed the paper,” she added. Mr. Taylor: Did you read it?—Yes. I have not the education to know what it was. Bankrupt said that she was told that the only thing she had to worry ,about if the appeal was dismissed was 'the fine of £1 and the 8/- costs. She had never had any account from Mr. Williams, nor had she been asked to pay costs. John Ernest Williams, stoker in H.M.A.S. Penguin, husband of the bankrupt, said he had heard of the proposed appeal to the High Court while he was in Fremantle on a cruise. When, he returned to Sydney he went to see Mr. T. F. Williams, a solicitor, of Elizabeth Street, Sydney, and asked him about the costs of the case. “Williams said there would be no costs, and that which ever way the case went we would not have to pay for anything,” he said. “I told him that if the costs were going to fall on us we could not fight it, and we must let it drop,” said witness. To Mr. Taylor witness said that Mr. Williams, the solicitor, had told him that if the case was won, he (witness) would get something out of it. The examination was concluded.