LOTTERY FOR CHARITY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21562, 5 August 1933, Page 13

LOTTERY FOR CHARITY

WELLINGTON CAMPAIGN TICKETS SOLD ILLEGALLY THREE MEN CONVICTED* The sale of lottery tickets on behalf of the Wellington branch of the St John Ambulance Association resulted in a prosecution of three Wellington men, Richard John Culver, Horace Harrison and Harojd Fairchild Pobar, before Mr. W. R. McKean, S.M., in the Police Court yesterday. Mr. Munro, for defendants, entered a plea of guilty to a charge of unlawfully selling the tickets. Detective-Sergeant O'Sullivan said defendants were associated with an organisation known as the Wellington Tramway Entertainers, which, for some years past, had assisted in charitable objects. In March last, the organisation was approached regarding a lottery for the Wellington branch of the St. John Ambulance, the prize in which was a motor-car. Defendants came to Auckland to organise sales in connection with the tickets, and the public, of course, thought the scheme Mas for the St. John Ambulance Association in Auckland. Such was not the case, as the Auckland organisation was not connected with the scheme. The lottery had not the necessary sanction. Counsel said Culver was the president of the organisation of entertainers. Pobar was a member, but Harrison was not. Unemployed men had taken a great part in assisting the scheme, which was purely for the worthy object of benefiting the St. John Ambulance. Auckland was not involved in the project, but the organisation elsewhere had approached the entertainers for their assistance. Apparently defendants had been wrongly informed about the position of official approval of the scheme, and it was an accident that the approval had not been obtained. Approval had been obtained, counsel pointed out, for another scheme of the same nature, which was to be launched shortly. Culver was fined £1 10s, and the other defendants were convicted and ordered to pay 10s costs each.