SLANDER ACTION.

Manawatu Standard, Volume L, Issue 221, 14 August 1930, Page 5

SLANDER ACTION.

CASE AT WELLINGTON. Per Press Association. • WELLINGTON, Aug. 13. Remarks alleged to have been made to one of his patients by a nurse employed by the Australasian Temperance and General Mutual Life Assurance Society, Ltd., were relied upon by Dr. Richard Walter Richards, of Wellington, in a slander action brought by him against the society in the Supreme Court to-day before Mr Justice Ostler and a jury. Mr A. Gray, K.C., and with him Mr J. S. Hanna appeared for the plaintiff, and Mr E. P. Bunny and with him Mr 11. F. O’Leary, for the society. Plaintiff claimed £IOOO damages, alleging that the nurse had spoken false, ly and maliciously about him in regard to his treatment of the patient, Mrs Dorothy Clara Bell, of Brooklyn. The defence admitted that the nurse had called on the patient in the course of her employment, but it was denied that she had made the alleged remarks or any words capable of bearing the same meaning. Even if the words had been used they were incapable of bearing the alleged slanderous meaning,, and they were not made by the mirse in the course of her employment. As a further defence it was urged that any remarks concerning the doctor were made honestly and without malice and on a privileged occasion. After hearing evidence on behalf of plaintiff, Mr Bunny moved for a nonsuit on the grounds that the words were not defamatory, that.the occasion was privileged, that there was no evidence of malice, that the expression of opinion was not in the scope of her employment and she was not acting under the authority of the defendant society. \ c-i..-a The question of a non-suit was reserved, and the case was adjourned until to-morrow morning.