SATURDAY NIGHT RAID.

Otaki Mail, 27 March 1939, Page 2

SATURDAY NIGHT RAID.

AUCKLAND POLICE MAKE CLEAN SWEEP. BIG CROWD WATCHES AUCKLAND, Last Night. Twenty-seven persons, three of them women, wore arrested by the police late on Saturday evening when they raided two adjoining houses in Hobson Street, opposite the Trades Hall, and seized quantities of liquor. In spite of the lateness of tlie hour and the fact that the raids occupied something like one and a-half hours, about 500 people crowded the roadway until the Black Maria had left with its final load. The arrested men and women spent tin week-end in the cells and will appear on varving charges before the Magistrate in the Police Court to-morrow. Tried Precarious Escape.

A party of 10 police officers raided both premises simultaneously shortly after 11 o'clock. They had little difficulty in securing entry, and scarcely before the occupants were aware of it every means of escape had been closed. One man happened to be looking out .0' an upstairs window as the police entered the front door of one house. He clambered out, evidently with the intention of making his escape along the top of the verandah but he capitulated when he saw a constable wailing for him on the road below. Three Trip;; to Station

As in all raids of this nature the police thoroughly examined every part of the two houses. A new Black Maria was brought into commission and it made three trips before those arrested and the police officers were all at tlie Central Police Station. Not till then did the largo crowd of curious onlookers disperse.