CASE AGAINST TENANTS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVIII, Issue 15, 15 December 1937, Page 11

CASE AGAINST TENANTS.

ALLEGED WRONGFUL EVICTION. Per Press Association. AUCKLAND, Dec. 14. Claiming £SO for alleged wrongful eviction from their room in a house in Mount Albert on October 10, Anthony and Phyllis Dracevich (Mr Goidwater) proceeded against Alfred Devine and Minnie Jane Devine (Mr Westbrooke) in the Magistrate’s Court before Mr C. R. Orr Walker, S.M., to-day. Mr Goidwater said plaintiffs had rented a room from the defendants, paying 6s a week, a condition being that Mrs Dracevich should look after defendants’ child on two days a week, as both defendants went out to work. The rent was paid up to October 12, but when plaintiffs, with their child, came home at 10 p.m. on Sunday, October 10, they found their belongings on the verandah and there was no answer to their knocks. Plaintiffs had to spend the night with Mr Dracevich’s mother and sent for their goods in the morning, continued Mr Goidwater. He contended that no landlord had the right to do such a thing, quite apart from the provisions of the Fair Rents Act. Plaintiffs would deny that they had been given any notice to quit. Giving judgment for plaintiffs, the Magistrate said Mrs Devine had no power to put plaintiffs’ belongings out and there must therefore have been trespass in their room. Mr Devine could not be held responsible for his wife’s actions. Judgment was given against Mrs Devine for £lO without costs, the Magistrate remarking that the amount was not all for material damage but was intended to show the Court’s attitude toward such actions. Legal machinery was provided for the eviction oi tenants.