CITRUS FARM SALE

Taranaki Daily News, 28 November 1934, Page 5

CITRUS FARM SALE

LAND ALLEGEDLY WORTHLESS.

ENGLISH ARCHITECT’S CLAIM.

By Telegraph—Press Association. Auckland, Last Night. An allegation that worthless land near Kaeo had been sold to a retired English architect in 1930 for the purposes of a citrus fruit farm was the basis of a claim for £1144 damages commenced before Mr. Justic Fair and a special jury of 12 in the Supreme Court. The claim was made by Tom Walter Thornton, farmer, Matamata, represented by Mr. Richmond and Mr. Mackay, against William Henry Ball, former director of New Zealand Citrus Plantations Ltd., represented by Mr. V. R. Meredith and Mr. Steadman. Thornton entered into an agreement with the company in May, 1930, to purchase 12 acres,, having been induced to do so by representations made on behalf of the company by David Rufus Williams. The chief of these were that the men responsible for the enterprise were well known business men who had their own plantations on the estate, that New Zealand Citrus Plantations Ltd. owned a large and fertile tract of land eminently suitable for successful citrus’culture, that the firm provided land which had been intensively cultivated and made suitable for the growth of large crops of citrus, and that there was in existence a. co-operative marketing company which was responsible for the marketing of all fruit on the estate. The first and last of these representations appeared in an overseas magazine of April, 1930, and the other two in & red-covered booklet handed by Williams to Thornton. These representations, Thornton claimed, were false and untrue, and when he came to New Zealand in November, 1932, with his wife and daughter he found the land to be worthless. He claimed a total of £1144 damages, made up of £786 paid for the land, £162 extra expenses incurred, £139 for loss of interest, and £ST for loss of exchange. . The defence denied any knowledge that the representations complained of had been made by Williams, and declared that he had neither express nor implied authority to negotiate for the company. Ball had no part in the publications complained of and he had reasonable ground to believe that any statements published with his approval were true. < Several witnesses were heard and Thornton was giving evidence when case was adjourned. 7 ■. V W '.O