MAGISTRATE’S WIFE

Greymouth Evening Star, 3 September 1938, Page 2

MAGISTRATE’S WIFE

CASE WITHOUT PARALLEL. LONDON, August 6. An attempt to keep secret the name of a woman motorist —believed to be without parallel in police court history —was scotched. Summoned at the South-western Police Court for exceeding the speed limit in Battersea Park, she was referred to merely as “35a.” . Later it was learned, that she was Mrs. Claud Mullins, of Burgh Heath 1 Road, Epsom, wife of the South-west- ‘ ern magistrate. Mr. Mullins usually sits at the South- • .western court on the first three days of the week, but the case was called - before Mr. Clyde Wilson, his colleague. The nature of the offence did not. • appear in the list, and the defendant’s • name was not mentioned in court. A : plea of guilty was entered. The defendant did not appear. , Mr. Wilson dismissed the case under ■ tlie Probation of Offenders Act on payment of £1 costs. He commented on the splendid record of the motorist, I after being told by Mr. J. G. Adams, an A.A. solicitor, defending, that she had a- clean record, although she had , been drivng many years. The prosecution was conducted by an L.C.C. solicitor, Mr. Kingsley Cannon, who said that when officers stopped her on June 29, she said, “I was doing about 25 m.p.h.” When Press representatives inquired as to the identity of the defendant, court officials and solicitors refused to give details. Later in the day the court reporter applied to the magistrate that the name should be disclosed, and Mr. Wilson ordered that to be done. The clerk then supplied the information that she was Mrs. Mullins. No explanation was offered as to why her,name had been suppressed in the first place. Last year a restriction was imposed on the Press at Bow Street, on the instructions of the chief magistrate. Sir Rollo Graham-Campbell, by which occupations and addresses of defendants could not be reported unless disclosed in court. The restriction was later revised following a question in the House of Commons commenting on injustice which might be caused by non-publication of addresses and occupations through similarity of names between innocent and offending persons.