The Sly Grog-Selling Case.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5874, 12 March 1887, Page 3

The Sly Grog-Selling Case.

♦ [B* TBIiBOaAPH.J [Special to the Stab.] DETAILS OF THE TRANSACTION. MAGISTERIAL. COMMON SENSE. WANGANUI, March 12. At the Police Court a charge of Belling liquor without being duly licensed was preferred by the police against a storekeeper at Mo whan ga Morimoho, named Louis Lawton. A man named George ! Gray deposed that on Feb. 10, when sports ! and races were held at Mowhanga, he pur- ' chased at defendant's store a bottle of whisky, for which he paid ten shillings. 1 Cross-examination of this witness elicited : the statement that he had purchased I liquor at other places, and that on the day I of the races he paw other people drinking. ; Witness admitted having been sentenced | to three years for cattJe stealing on the i East Coast. A Native lad corroborated j Gray's evidence on the material points. | Defendant said he gave the first witness ; liquor on his ropreFentation that bad i liquor wag being consumed by people "> attending the races, and that they would i be ill and require come good stuff to bring them round. He did not sell the liquor, but gave it. In crossexamination, defendant admitted he gave good customers liquor. The nearest hotel was thirty- three miles away. Altogether he gave away about one gallon of whiskey at the races. For the defence a witaees was called who deposed that they had obtained liquor from defendant, but he had not been charged for it. Witness then went on to relate the cireumetAnce of having had a glass or two too mucli. He did not explain where he got his liquor, but defendant gave him R^me whiskey to keep him straight. His Worship said the evidence of no sale was not sufficient to upset the information, and it did not appear feasible to him that a person living in that country — and he knew the district well — would be likely to keep liquor to gyve away ad lib., considering the difficulty to be encountered in getting it there. He had seen the effects himself on men who had obtained liquor in and around the district mentioned. The etnrff sold was generally doctored and reduced, those imbibing it being reduced to a state of coma. The defendant was fined £20, and costs £4, 19 a. The fine was paid. Another charge of a similar character against a Native hailing from the same district was alao to have come on, but just before the Court eat he was arrested at the suit of a judgment creditor. From the general tenor of tfae evidence given in the first case, it would appear that illicit liquor selling goes on at a great pace in the back parts of the Wanganui and Patea districts, and detection is almost impossible, owing to the police supervision being almost nil.