MAGISTRATE AND POLICE.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LVI, Issue LVI, 29 January 1909, Page 5

MAGISTRATE AND POLICE.

fPER PRESS ASSOCIATION.}

AUCKLAND, January 29

Mr Kettle, S.M., in the case of the police against William Henry Wrathall, licensee of the St. Heliers Bay Hotel, for Sunday trading, fined defendant £15 on each of the three convictions. His Worship went on to say that he saw nb reason to alter the opinion he expressed yesterday about the manner in which this case was brought. It was not a proper thing for anyone, especially constables and detectives, to tempt or induce or procure any person to commit any kind of offence with a view of prosecuting them if they fell. He thought that anyone who went to an hotel at an hour when the sale of liquor was illegal and attempted to get served, was in law equally guilty with the licensee who served him. In his Worship's opinion it was a wr.ong thing for anyone, policeman or detective, to go into an hotel and by offering money induce the licensee to commit a breach of the Act. Their conduct was in his opinion, contrary to his Worship's sense of British fair play.

Dimock's dates for receiving pigs during February are published to-day.