BOOKMAKER FINED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19929, 24 April 1928, Page 14

BOOKMAKER FINED.

PENALTY OF SIXTY POUNDS. "A HUNDRED BETS A DAY." TWO TELEPHONES IN USE. Found guilty of conducting a common gaming house iri rooms in the National Chambers, City, Philip George Hugh Mulligan, aged 43, was fined £6O in the Police Court yesterday. A charge against a professional wrestler, Mahamed Ali Sunni, aged 31, of being found on the premises of a common gaming house was dismissed.

Betting material was found in the place when the police visited it on Saturday. Slips on which were bet-markings were discovered on Sunni.

For Sunni, Mr. Allan Moody said Mulligan conducted the wrestler's correspondence, as Sunni could not write. When the police raided the place Sunni was there to get Mulligan to write a cable for him to send to Australia concerning a wrestling match that was forthcoming. Accepting this explanation, which was confirmed by Sunni in the witness-box, the magistrate, Mr. W. It. McKean, dismissed tho charge. "With regard to Mulligan," said Mr. Terry, on accused's behalf, "he certainly cannot deny that he keeps the premises for the purpose of bookmaking, but he is only in a small way." Sub-Inspector McCarthy: 1 cannot agree with that. He keeps two big books, in which bets are recorded, and as many as 20 bets were received over the telephones while tho police were there. There are two telephones in the room and he has a full and complete system. If he can be described as a small bookmaker, then I would like to know what a big one is. Some days ho received over 100 bets and ho got nundreds of pounds. Mr. Terry: You know very well that there are many bigger bookmakers active in tins city. Sub-Inspector McCarthy: 1 am afraid I do not. If there were, we would hear ol them.

Mr. Terry: Well, if you don't know, your colleagues, the detectives, do. And I think everyone else knows, too. Books and records were then perused by the magistrate, who said: "If this is not a big bookmaker, who is ? The maximum fine is £IOO, but I will take into consideration that ho has made a clean breast ol it all. He is fined £60."