BOOKMAKER FINED £l00

Taranaki Daily News, 17 July 1929, Page 11

BOOKMAKER FINED £l00

NARROW ESCAPE FROM GAOL ELTHAM RESTAURANT PROPRIETOR. THE SECOND OFFENCE PUNISHED. Antonio Novak, an Eltliam restaurant proprietor, was fined £lOO at the Elthani Court yesterday for carrying on the business of a bookmaker. Accused for whom Mr. A. Chrystal appeared, pleaded guilty. He was one of 13 arrested in police raids on Saturday. Detective A. B. Meiklejohn stated that a constable in plain clothes had no difficulty in making two bets with the accused, one on June 22 on the Hawke’s Bay races and the other on July 12 on the Wellington meeting. Both were 10s bets. The police raided the. premises oji July 13 and seized material pertaining to betting. Some time ago accused was fined £5O for a similar offence, said the detective. Complaints had been received that betting was still going on ami.-the • police took action.

Mr. Chrystal submitted that there were circumstances. When convicted 20 months ago accused was gradually going out of the business. The fine of £5O, however, made serious inroads into his finances and to make ends' meet ho did a foolish thing—he commenced bookmaking in a small way. The magistrate, Mr. R. W. Tate, in inflicting the fine of £lOO, said: “You are infringing the laws and you have committed an offence for which you are liable to a fine of £5OO or imprisonment for two years. I have to . ask myself what justification I have for fining you at all and not sending you to gaol, where you would have a long time to reflect on the unwisdom, of your offence. But I do not propose to send you to gaol because you are a foreigner. I have not yet sent a man to gaol for bookmaking and I want to commence on one of my own race.”

In granting two months in which to pay the fine the magistrate said: “I want you to understand that you have narrowly escaped gaol.”