LICENSING ACT.

Manawatu Standard, Volume L, Issue 219, 12 August 1930, Page 9

LICENSING ACT.

BREACHES ALLEGED. COURT IMPOSES FINES. Five charges relating to breaches of the Licensing Act were heard in the Palmerston North Magistrate’s Court yesterday before Mr J. L. Stout, S.M., Frederick Joseph Swindell, licensee of the Imperial Hotel, was charged with allowing liquor to be sold on the premises after hours. Mary Frances Swindell was charged with supplying liquor to three men who were not lawfully entitled to be supplied on the premises, the latter being charged with being unlawfully on the premises after hours. „ Sergeant Hill stated that at 8.15 p.m. on Saturday, July 26, when with a constable he saw Mrs Swindell carrying a tray with glasses from the smoking room to the bar. Two men each had a glass of beer in front of him and they admitted that they were not lodgers. Each advanced explanations for his presence on the premises after hours. Mrs Swindell explained that one was a family friend and had stayed at the hotel on the preceding night She admitted supplying the drinks and receiving payment, . ~ Mr Oram stated that Mrs Swindell had been in business for over twenty years and this was the first occasion on which she had been charged with a breach of the Act. She had been asked to obtain drinks for the friends of one of the men and had done so without thinking for a moment of the legal aspect. It was not a serious offence, as the other two men had accompanied their friends when he went to pay for the previous night’s board. His Worship imposed fines of £5 on Mrs Swindell, £1 on F. J. Swindell and £2 in each of the three men illegally on the premises.