"A PUBLIC PLACE."

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18457, 21 July 1923, Page 7

"A PUBLIC PLACE."

DEFINITION OF A BEACH.

KULING OF MAGISTRATE.

Decision was given by Mr. W. R. McKean, S.M., in' the Police Court, yesterday in the case where Richard Julius Brendel (Mr. Milne) was charged with having discharged a rifle so as to endanger passers-by.

The magistrate said he shad overruled the objection Ix> the form of the information and reserved decision in the question whether the place where the defendant discharged his rifle was a public place. The defendant was testing a rifle of small calibre, and standing below high-water mark at Hobson Bay. ' He discharged a number oc? shots at & tin lying between him and the water. The portion of the foreshore on whioh he was standing appeared to be part of the area vested in the Auckland Harbour Board.

" The place," said Mr McKean, " is one to which the public resort, -but this fact alone does not make it a public place within the meaning of the Police Offences Act. The public's right of access may be restricted by the Harbour Board. The place might be a public place within the meaning of the Gaming and Lotteries Act, which includes all places wherever the public may assemble, but, in my opinion, it is not a place to whioh the public are entitled to go as a matter of right. The fact that it is a .place to which they go as a-matter of fact is not sufficient to make it a public place within the meaning of the Police Offences Act. There is no evidence to show whether this spot is sufficiently near to a publics place to alarm or endanger nassers-by. The information is therefore dismissed."