ELTHAM LIBEL CASE.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 20 June 1928, Page 6

ELTHAM LIBEL CASE.

RESERVED- JUDGMENT DELIVERED. FULL DAMAGES TO- PLAINTIFF.' Mr Rl. W. Tate, S.M., at the Eltham Magistrate’s Court yesterday delivered his reserved judgment in the civil action for recovery of £250 damages instituted by G. 11. P. Fitzgerald; manager and secretary of the New Zealand, Rennet Company, Eltham, against the “Dairyman’' newspaper proprietary and Blundell Brothers, Wellington. It will be lememlbeied that the plaintiff took action in respect of statements published in the “Dairyman” of February 2P, 1928, regarding the standard of the product manufactured -by plaintiff for his company. Judgment was given for the full amount claimed, with costs £36 2s. “1 have considered the whole of the article and can find nothing in it in the nature of an antidote; nothing to qualify the effect of the words complained about,” said the magistrate in the course of his judgment, with regard to the defence of fair comment. “They are merely misstatements of facts and not comment at all. I see no reason to reduce plaintiff’s olaim for damages.'’ At the hearing Mr A. Ghrystal appeared for plaintiff" and Mir F. O. Spratt for defendants.