POLICE COURT NEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18563, 22 November 1923, Page 7

POLICE COURT NEWS.

AETSiAUVn ON TAXI-DRIVER.

MAORI PASSENGER'S OFFENCE.

A taxi-driver's experience with a Maori passenger who took exception to a request for the fare was related in the Police Court yesterday, before Mr. J. W. Poyntbn, S.M. when i Kani Te Puhi, aged 50, who did' not appear} was charged with drunkenness, : failing to pay the prescribed taxi fare, v and assaulting a taxidriver. "' , - * Evidence was, given thai on Tuesday morning accused engager, the taxidriver to drive him to the wharf, and he was later driven' to several hotels, \ where Te Puhi, who was intoxicated, was refused liquor. ; When the fare amounted to £1 he was asked for it He struck the taxi-driver, with the result that the car swerved, s.nd an accident was narrowly avoided. ". -* ■ . , '•;•-, „ '', Accused, who had been bailed out in the sum of £5, was fined £1 for drunkenness, and £2 for the . assault, and ordered to; pay the taxi fare,: £1, and witness' expenses, £1. * -.j n < ALLEGED THEFT DENIED. The theft of ah umbrella, valued at 15s, which had disappeared from a house in Vincent Street •on Saturday, was denied by William Knox (Mr. Holmden), a fish hawker, aged 50. The principal witness was a lad, who said he saw accused, whom he knew, in Vincent Street carrying an umbrella, which the boy recognised as belonging to ihis sister, and which he was later informed had been stolen. 1 '' v' i; . - Accused, in evidence, said he was selling fish on the Great South Road on Saturday afternoon. .. . On i the application of Senior-Detective Hammond, - the case : was adjourned till to-day, In order that accused statement as to his inWements might be verified. /, / THEFT OF A POSTAL NOTE. When Hiram Nixon, aged 36, admitted the theft "01 a postal note for £1, Senior-Detective Hammond said that in December last accused was staying at a boarding house at Frankton with another man, who dropped the postal note. When subsequently interviewed by the police accused admitted picking it up, and he handed it over to the police. The authorities had- then lost track of him for some time. There was nothing previously known against him,- except drunkenness. .-......'•" _ - ;' • . ■ Accused was convicted and discharged. ' I aj :