GAMING RAID

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22954, 4 February 1938, Page 6

GAMING RAID

104 MEN ARRESTED _i • .. v EXCITEMENT IN SYDNEY V — l . " ; V DEMONSTRATION, BY CROWD • ■ —~ [from oub OWN correspondent] : ..V, '.i' SYDNEY. Jan. 28.? Extraordinary scenes were -witnessed ♦! outside the Sydney watchhouse in Rfig. sell Street while 104 men from Clif. v ton Hill, who had been arrested in' g gaming raid, were being bailed out. A crowd of several hundred friends and sympathisers stood o.utside tha watchhouse and cheered each man as he was released. Others shouted worda of encouragement to friends through the windows of the watchhouse office. The raid took place about 5 p. m , •; at a club in Queen's Parade, Clifton Hill, where the men were caught at ')! a result of strategy. As two constables in uniform walked toward the club a large number of men who were stand, ing near tbe door went inside. Af the same moment a motor-truck con. taining gaming police stopped outside the door of the club, and the polios rushed in with the members. Meanwhile, another squad of gaming police was climbing over the back fence and battering the steel-hound back door with Hledge-hammers and axes. Eventually the door was opened by; persons inside ? and the police entered in time, it is alleged, to 6ecure ®,, ; quantity of betting material. ' • Every man in the club was arrested* It is alleged that they were betting on the races. Seven boys, aged about' 15 vears, were allowed to go. A crowd of Ijetween 500 and 600 persons ex. pressed its hostility by kicking tho fiides of a prison van and hooting the police. More police were called from' Russell Street to control the crowd:, On the way to the watchhouse tbe Erisoners made the van lurch sidewaji y alternately, throwing their weigit on each side. Tuneless singing marked each of the four journeys. At the city watchhouse 104 men were each charged with having been found in a common gaming house. One man acted as a bondsman for about " 90 of the men, the bail being £5 for each prisoner. The last prisoner bailed out. at. 10 p.m.