"STRATFORD EVENING POST" TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 1928. THE WAYS OF JUSTICES.

Stratford Evening Post, Issue 40, 25 September 1928, Page 4

"STRATFORD EVENING POST" TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 1928. THE WAYS OF JUSTICES.

THERE is a good deal of perturbation in Auckland at present over a motor prosecution which took place there recently. A man wa s charged, before Justices of the Peace, with breaking a traffic law in Kyber Pass. Read. The information was laid by an Inspector in the employ of the City Council, and in due course the case came before the Court. The defendant lived in the Bay of Plenty district, and went up to Auckland for the hearing. He was able to prov e that at the time of the alleged offence his car was partly dismantled in a glrage in the Bay of Plenty area, and he was also in the district. The Bench dismissed the charge; it was the only thing they could do, but when a u application was made for costs against the City Council it. was refused, one of the justices, with a display of wisdom that waß trul y amazing, remarking that if the car and the owner were not in Auckland at the time, the number plate must have been. It is only natural that the silly incident should give rise to a controversy, and one newspaper made an attack on J.'sP. in general, whom it described as being as numerous as rabbits. There are certainly some very foolish people appointed as Justices of the Peace at times, but this does not justify th e whole of the "great unpaid" being condemned. Many Justices possess good sound common sense, and are actuated by a high regard for duty, but the trouble is that others, either from sheer inability or from a misguided notion of their own importance are rather prone to take advantage of every opportunity to make fodls of themselves. In this district it must be said that we are fortunate i n the majority of the Justices who appear o n the Bench. Other districts are not so lucky.