LIBEL ALLEGED

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17231, 10 April 1930, Page 15

LIBEL ALLEGED

NEWSPAPER REPORT TAXIDRIVER CLAIMS £2OO (Per Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, this day. A claim for £2OO damages for alleged libel by George Williams Goodge, a taxidriver, against the Sun newspaper was heard by the magistrate, Mr. J. A. Young, to-day. The case arose out of a report of a by-law prosecution, in which Goodge was fined 5s fur being asleep in bis taxi. The statement complained of was: “Tired taxidrivers are evidently one of the products of the competition among taxis in Christchurch at present. Georgia Goodge may not have been ‘out. on the booze’ on November 18, but lie certainly was asleep in his cab on the railway station stand, so Mr. E. D. Mosley, S.M., fined him 5s and costs for the offence.”

Mr. Moloney, counsel for the plaintiff, said that the defendants bad already paid £SO into court. He submitted that the full amount, should be awarded as the plaintiff had suffered considerably from the publication of the statement, which was unwarranted and was due to a desire for sensationalism. His client was temperate in habits and the question of liquor had never been mentioned in the original case: (Proceeding.)