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NZ Truth, Issue 216, 14 August 1909, Page 4

sider its character. He had said IT WAS DELIBERATE AND INSOLENT, made with a full knowledge thai; it was contempt. The object with which it was made was equally unmistakeable. Parliament had found it necessary to limit m certain cases the press of the Dominion m the exercise of the discretion which it had before possessed m publishing the evidence of proceedings m our Courts. That, it could be seen by the Parliamentary records of the debate on the Bill, arose from the recent coming into existence of journals of .the class of which the newspaper with whicli he was then (JecUing was there quoted as tin illustration, as it notoriously was. The only object of that newspaper m defying or attempting to evade the law must have been itsi inability to resist the publication of a particularly salacious specimen ot the class of cases by the publication of which it lived and thrived. To accomplish that it had taken the risk of insulting and dsfying the law of the Court. It was obviously a case for exemplary punishment. The present defendant alieged, and it might be assumed truthfully, that he did not see the manuscript of the article complained of until it had been published, and that, to the best of his recollection, he was not m Wellington when it was published, but by assuming the position of the registered manager of the newspaper, he undertook the liability for what appeared m it. That was shown, if authority .were needed, by ex parte Green, m the matter of Rohbins of the Press Association, 7.T.L.R. 418. He could not but be aware of the character and tone of the publication whose responsibility he assumed. He had taken no steps to disclose the person or persons actually responsible. Pie had, m the present instance, to regard the fact that the defendant was probably not directly responsible for the contempt, by not sentencing him to imprisonment, a penalty he certainly would have inflicted on the writer or wilful publisher of tho article. The defendant must not, however, rely on such immunity continuing. As to the money penalty, he had suggested on the hearing Ihat the person legally responsible would be indemnified by the proprietor or proprietors. To that he had recorded no denial. In any case it must be shown that newsnaper proprietors and others responsible for such conduct as 1 c was tlrh dealing with could not eveape pcn'liics by sheltering thcmsjlves l.e'fnd nomnl , defendants. Vox the sross and offensive contempt committed the defendant would be fined £100 with costs as between solicitor and client, to be taxed.