FORCING THE ISSUE

Timaru Herald, Volume CLVIII, Issue 23262, 25 July 1945, Page 7

FORCING THE ISSUE

Prison Sentences For Bookmakers (N.Z.P.A.) WELLINGTON. July 22. In his charge to the Grand Jury to-day the Chief Justice, the Rt. Hon. Sir Michael Myers. said that although the calendar did not contain any charges against bookmakers, he thought he should say a few words on the subject. He did not care whether bookmaking was lawful or not. It was the duty of a judge to administer the law. As long |as it was an unlawful business he would carry out the law, and on those occasions when a person had been charged before him with bookmaking and had been convicted he had sent him to prison. He always said that if the courts carried out the spirit of the law, and when a person had been convicted and came up again, if he was sentenced to imprisonment, one or other of two things would happen within 12 months, said Sir Michael. Either bookmaking would be substantially reduced or there would be some amendment of the law. He did not say bookmaking would oe eliminated altogether, but the law was not to be flouted to anything like the extent it was flouted now.' It was not for him to say or suggest how the law should be amended. It had nothing to do with him, but he did say the courts should do their best to see that the law was observed in the spirit as well as in the letter and that they should not, by constantly fining bookmakers, adopt a system which amounted to nothing more or iess than licensing the bookmaker to continue his unlawful trade.