MAGISTRATE’S COURT.

Taranaki Daily News, 25 November 1922, Page 2

MAGISTRATE’S COURT.

A SERIOUS CHARGE. On three charges oi committing acts of indecency with intent to insult certain women, Charles Goodall appeared on remand at the Magistrate's Court at New Plymouth yesterday before Mr. A. M. Mowlem, S.M., and, pleading not guilty, was committed to the Supreme Court for trial. Detective-Sergeant Cooney, in outlining the case for the police, said that the acts alleged were committed on the mornings of November 15 and 17. The complainants were married women, and the accused lived in a tent in the same locality. He was alleged to have occasioned one of the women the same annoyance previously, but at that time she had had no one with her to corroborate her evidence, and on that account and because of her natural reticence, she had refrained from notifying the police. Subsequently, however, the detective-sergeant stated, the accused had repeated his conduct in the presence of two women, and he had been arrested. Evidence was given by the complainants and by the police who arrested Goodall. Mr. W. H. Freeman (who appeared for the accused) contended that a prima facie case of intent to insult had not been made out, but Mr. Mowlem replied that he was there to determine not as to whether there had been intention to insult or offend, but as to whether a prima facie case had been made out which would justify him in sending the accused to the Supreme Court for trial. He considered that such a case had been established, and Goodall was accordingly remanded to the coming sessions of the Supreme Court, bail being allowed in his own recognisance of £2OO and two sureties of £lOO each.