EXTRAORDINARY STORY

Northern Advocate, 18 January 1936, Page 3

EXTRAORDINARY STORY

MAN CHARGED WITH ASSAULT I Special to '‘Northern Advocate.”] AUCKLAND, This Day. A story, which the magistrate described as extraordinary, was unfolded in the Police Court this morning during the hearing of a charge of assault against a labourer, Charles Robert Lowen. He pleaded guilty to assaulting a woman in Pitt Street. At 9.45 last night, said Sub-Inspector Fox, the complainant was walking along Pitt Street, when, at the intersection of Pitt Street and Grey Avenue, she was accosted by Lowen, who told her that she had no business to be “hanging around there.” He struck her two blows on the face, but they did not cause any damage. He then shook her. She managed to break away from the man, and summoned a constable. A young woman overheard accused remark: “You have to be careful of these women. They are after money.” f “The complainant is a respectable married woman, and, at the time of the assault, she was on her way to meet her son,” said Mr Fox. “Lowen was unable to give any explanation. He was not on the scene when the constable arrived, but later he emerged from a Chinese shop, and admitted the assault. “There seems to be no reason in the world why he should have struck, this woman, except that he may have mistaken her for someone else,” said Mr Noble, who appeared for Lowen. “He seems to be a simple sort of man. He does not even drink.” Mr McKean, S.M.: “Is he an amateur censor of morals in the city?” Mr Noble: “I don’t think he looks like it. Does he?” I

“Well, it’s an extraordinary thing,” remarked the magistrate. Mr McKean asked Lowen if he knew the woman. “Yes, I know her well by sight,” said Lowen. Complainant was then asked to come forward. She told the magistrate she did not know accused. “You do. You spoke to me first last night,” said Lowen. This the woman denied, adding that she would not have gone and called a constable if she had been in the wrong. Low&n was remanded for sentence until Monday, the magistrate'suggesting that he should be examined m the meantime.