LICENSING ACT

Southland Times, Issue 22474, 9 November 1934, Page 7

LICENSING ACT

INTERESTING COURT ACTION.

APPEAL BEING HEARD.

(Per United Press Association.)

Palmerston North, November 8. An unusual case is being heard in the Supreme Court, before Mr Justice Blair. Police-Sergeant Angland is appealing against the decisions of Mr J. L. Stout, S.M., given at Feilding in August when three men, Albert Edward Hosken, Roy Gordon Hosken and John David Farmer, were charged with aiding the commission of an offence by the licensee of the Manchester Hotel, Feilding, D. P. Barrett, namely, the sale of liquor after hours. The Magistrate, in dismissing . the charges, said defendants had admitted to the police being on licensed premises after hours and procuring liquor, but they were not found on the premises by the police. The Magistrate held that they could not be charged with _ a breach of the Licensing Act, contending that the Act was a special one containing a code of license offences. The Legislature had not intended to make it an offence to purchase liquor after hours except in a breach of Section 194 of the Act; secondly, consideration of the penalties showed it could never have been intended to render the purchasers liable to the penal clauses of Section 190. Under Section 194 the maximum penalty is £2 and under 190 it is £2O. There could be no suggestion that the Legislature intended to impose such a penalty for one purchasing a drink after hours who was not found by the police on the premises and that a person caught on the premises should only be liable for a £2 fine. Lastly the defendant was the purchaser and not the seller. It was straining the Justices of the Peace Act to suggest that the purchaser aided the seller to sell his goods. Decision was reserved.