JAY PAY JUSTICE.

NZ Truth, Issue 179, 21 November 1908, Page 6

JAY PAY JUSTICE.

Gaoling a First Offender.

j Bill Smith, .of Christchurch, is a hamnI less sort of cuss and respectably connected m business, but he went out and took too many the other night, probably as a protest against the ranting of the prohibition fanatics m the Square. Bill was' annoyed at something and called a man a blanky, . blanking blankard, and told him to go and blank. It was m the hearing; of a peeler who was looking for a sergeant's stripes, and he promptly collared William. That person is law-abid-. ing, and had never been m the: arms of a copper, ,so that he resisted with violence, a circumstance that aggravated his offence*. Next day George Pay ling and Sykes, jJtVs, occupied the Bench, and George was greatly shocked by the language used. After consultation with his colleague, the ex-Mayor, whose motor was awaiting him outside, gave Smith seven days m Cleary's Hell, without the option, and the prisoner, who had no previous bad mark against his honored name, looked dazed and unbelieving. HE PLEADED FOR A FINE, There was business, to ' look after and lie had a tearful, wife m Court. Pay ling remarked, with severity, that the expression used was a very filthy one. Smith acknowledged it but explained that he had a few drinks m and was haxdly responsible. The amateur magistrate, however, ; again consulted with his colleague, and made answer, with asperity, that .he ' couldn't alter his decision.) So Smith went up . and his affairs have gone to blazes, just because our J .P. system doesn't enjoin upon the temporary shopkeeping magistrates a common knowledge of what sort of sentences should be imposed m these cases. Were Smith a repeated offender, seven days m the- Nick might be a proper punishment, .but to send a res-pectably-connected person to ' gaol on the occasion of his first appearance m a court is a travesty upon Justice, and is yet another instance of the necessity for a revision of the powers of J.P.'s."