TOLL CHARGES.

Otago Witness, Issue 1934, 19 March 1891, Page 13

TOLL CHARGES.

At the City Police Court on the 13th. Arthur Coxhead was charged on the information of William Allen, with evading payment of the toll on the Portobello road on the 2nd March, in respect of a certain vehicle and horse, he (defendant) having fraudulently pretended that the said vehicle and horse was employed for the sole purpose of conveying children to school. Mr Atkinson appeared to prosecute, and Mr R. L. Stanford to defend. — Mr Atkinson said that proceedings were taken with a view of testing the validity of a certain method of evading the toll on the Portobello road, of which Mr Coxhead had recently availed himself. There was no dispute that Mr Allen had the right to demand the toll, and— Mr Stanford : We don't admit the right. We admit nothing.— Mr Atkinson: The right bad never been challenged. .The ground on which, defendant had sought to evade the toll -was On the sth clause of the 107 th section of "The Public Works Act 1882," which exempted vehicles from paying toll which were solely employed in conveying; children to or from school. The circumstances of the case were as follows :— Defendant lived about three miles on the Portobello side of the Waverley tollgate, and was in the habit of proceeding to town every* morning. He paid tolls during the month of January, but in February he commenced to take hi 3 children to school. He then made it a practice, when he arrived within 200 or 300 yards of the toll gate, to alight from the vehicle and walk by the side of the trap through the toll gate, getting up again and driving on after passing on a couple of hundred yards. In the evening he would repeat the process in converse order. The question was whether a vehicle which travelled under those conditions came within the terms of the exemption. Of course his, Worship would see that if such a reading were put on the act, omnibuses and such vehioles could also claim exemption merely by allowing a conple of sohool ohildren to travel in it. — William Allen, toll' gate keeper, gave evidence. He stated that the defendant, on the date mentioned in the charge, merely cried out " No toll" when he arrived at the gate? He then passed on,— Robert Raynbird deposed that notification of the toll was published in the Otago Witness, a newspaper which circulated in the district. — Mr Stanford said that before going into the merits of the case he would submit that on the face of it the information was bad. The charge was that on a certain day Mr Coxhead made a certain fraudulent pretence, or falsely claimed exemption. The evidence was that, on arriving at the toll gate the keeper said to him "Toll," and the defendant replied "No toll." Those were all the' words that passed, and there was no fraudulent pretence in those words, nor anything false. They were not charged with an evasion of the toll, but of fraudulent pretence.— The Bench upheld counsel's contention. The tollkeoper should have distrained upon the vehicle and got a reason, if he wanted one, why defendant did not pay. There might be a debt dve — and according to the evidence it seemed there was— bat the keeper should have distrained or sued. — Mr Stanford eaid that, irrespective of his objection, defendant had a good defence. The trap was really used for taking the children to school, and if it were not for the children the trap would Hot be used at all. — Information dismissed.