DRUGGED AND ROBBED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 19177, 17 November 1925, Page 12

DRUGGED AND ROBBED.

DRUNK MOTORIST'S PLEA. MAN FINED AND PROHIBITED. [bi* telegraph.— own correspondent.] HAMILTON, Monday. An unusual plea was put forward by Mr. B. K Adams, counsel: for Ashley Arthur Bluett, who was charged in the Hamilton Court to-day, before justices, with being drunk while in charge of a motor-car. Defendant pleaded guilty. The facts, &.t .stated by Senior-Ser-geant Sweeney, were that defendant was found on Saturday evening in a state of helpless drunkenness on the Te liapa lload, between the racecourse and Kgaruav/ahia. The wheel-marks of the car showed that the vehicle had zigzagged for -omc distance, and had pulled up in a ditch, Mr, Adams said that Bluett, who Was a farmer with a young family, was a thoroughly decent- man. He had about seven drinks on the racecourse on Saturday, and was perfectly sober at the time of the seventh race. Tv.o men approached him. and asked him lor money. Iff. refused to give them any, and they invited him tr, have a dmk. lie bad a drink with them, and soon afterward he !o i confciousness, and remembered nothing further untii he woke up in the police cells on Sunday. He then found that he had been mooed oi C 5. Counsel suggested that defendant bad bc u drngged" and robbed by th" men who had ' accosted him. i he Bench: If he was unconscious, how did he find his car out of the hundreds that were on the racecourse ? Mr. Adams: 1 cannot say. It is inexplicable how he was able to pick out his car and pass through a cordon of police and traffic inspectors without being noticed. Senior-Sergeant Sweeney; Tie was able to buy totalisator tickets for the last race. The. Bench said that- the Court looked upon this class of case an. very serious. '4' ho traffic near Hamilton on Saturday was extraordinary, and it was a miracle that defendant had got as far as he did without a serious accident. The Bench warned defendant that he could h<j sent to prison for three months. In view of what Mr. Adams had said he would be lined £5, and would be prohibited.