POLICE COURT NEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18121, 20 June 1922, Page 3

POLICE COURT NEWS.

ASSAULT IN THE STREET. YOUNG MAN FINED £10. An episode in Swanaon Street on Friday evening resulted in Ernest Charles Edwards (Mr. Dickson), aged 26, being charged in the Police Court yesterday—before Mr. J. W. Poynton, S.M.—with having assaulted Alexander Gamble. Complainant, a waterside worker, said he was walking along Swanson Street iwhen' he met a man who wanted to fight. Witness put his hand out to push the other man away. He received a blow in the body and a punch in the Face, falling to the. ground. Then he wasi kicked in the face. He did not know the man who struck him. Cross-examined, complainant said he had had a few drinks, but denied he was in a fighting mood. A girl said she saw accused and Gamble arguing in the street. A woman separated them. Then witness saw Gamble lying on the ground and accused striking him. Another witness said that Gamb.e was lying on the ground bleeding from the face when witness got to the scene. Witness could not say who struck Gamble. Constable Mark 3 said that when arrested on warrant accused said the other man struck him first. • Accused said that Gamble accosted him and struck him in the' face. Accused asked him to go to. a yard where they could settle the matter. A fight did take place. ' The magistrate said he had serious doubts aa to whether he should not send.accused to gaol. This was his last chance. Accused was fined £10 and costs, half the fine to go to the injured man, in default two months' imprisonment. THEFT ON RACECOURSE. A young woman, Rita Martin (Mr. Sullivan), denied having stolen £2. from Joseph Wright at the race meeting at Ellerslie on June 7. Wright said that when he was at the bar in the outside enclosure accused asked him to get her a drink. He did so, and then felt a slight' touch on his pocket. He saw accused put her hand up to her throat, and, being suspicious, he put his hand in his pocket nnd discovered £2 was missing. He asked accused to return it. She at first denied having taken it, but subsequently returned it, taking it from her dress. Accused said she was somewhat under the influence of drink at the time. Accused was sentenced to oue month's imprisonment. TROUBLE AT ROTO ROA. Peter Bradley charged with, insubordination while an inmate at Roto Roa Island. Major McCauley, officer-in-charge of the Salvation Army staff at the island, said that Bradley had been an inmate for the past ten weeks. He had been terribly injured in a mining Explosion nt Huntly'some-time ago, and, owing to hi a facial affliction was kept apart from 'other patients. , He seemed, to resent this. He was given a special diet, but frequently threw the food away. Hb was never satisfied, and lately would not eat his food. The officers on the island always treated accused leniently, and endured a good deal, but accused wag most insolent toward the staff and traded on his injury. Witness had written to the Minister for Justice requesting that Bradley should be transferred from the island. The magistrate agreed that Bradley could not be tolerated on the island. The unfortunate man could not work. Ho would sentence accused to a month in Mount Eden until the transfer was put through.