ASSAULT ON SOLDIER.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LV, Issue 16783, 25 February 1918, Page 7

ASSAULT ON SOLDIER.

HOTEL LICENSEE FINED. "COWARDLY AND UNPROVOKED." Judgment was given in Wellington on Friday by Mr. S. E. McCarthy. S.M., upon a charge against Albert Rowland Dun-ant, licensee of the New Commercial Hotel, of assaulting a soldier named Herbert Cutts on February 2. The magistrate said that Cutts and five other soldiers called at the New Commercial Hotel, and just before 6 p.m. the barmaid told them they must leave as it was closing time. The men told the barmaid they wanted dinner. There was no suggestion that any of the men were under the influence of liquor or other than reputable and able to pay for their entertainment. While the men were in the hotel there were sounds of breaking bottles, but the men had nothing to do ■with this, although defendant declared that he saw Cutts breaking bottles on the top edge of the bottle-bin, but no trace of broken bottles was found there. Cutts and his mates denied that the former had broken any of the bottles, and the magistrate said he believed Cutts and his party and disbelieved defendant, " who has clearly set up the bottle-breaking incident as the result of an afterthought. ' When ordered to leave the hotel Cutts and his mates said. they were stopping j for dinner, and it was not suggested that defendant could not have accommodated the soldiers with a meal. When again ordered out of the hotel Cutts said to his mates, "Come on, boys; this is how they treat soldiers. They first take our money and then turn us out on the street." Defendant declared that he offered to return the soldiers their money, but this they all denied. What the defendant did was to punch Cutts on the mouth with his clenched fists. Defendant's account was that Cutts struck him first, and that any blows defendant administered to Cutts were in self-defence. Sergeant Wade, who saw defendant immediately after tho assault, stated that defendant's face was not marked. Moreover, defendant's witness, Sergeant Craig, a soldier, admitted that he had endeavoured to dissuade Cutts from proceeding any further with the mat ter. It must not be overlooked." Mr. McCarthy concluded, "that defendant is a licensed publican, and therefore an innkeeper, clothed with rights and duties of innkeepers, whilst Cutts and his mates were to his. knowledge travellers, and, as such, entitled to the meal they asked for. With this defendant unlawfully refused to supply them. Not only that, he wrongly accused Cutts and his mates of breaking bottles and committed on Cutts a cowardly and unprovoked assault. Moreover, he has attempted to escape punishment by setting up a perjured defence." Defendant was convicted and fined £10, I and ordered to pay expenses, in default two months' imprisonment.