TWO MEN AND A FIRE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 16905, 2 December 1922, Page 13

TWO MEN AND A FIRE.

A CHARGE DISMISSED. LICENSEE CENSURED. The details of a fire in a timber yard in Tuam Street earlier in the week were recounted in the Magistrate’s Court this morning when Benjamin Ei-ridge and James Matthew Smith were charged with wilfully damaging a j quantity of timber, the property of i Waller and Sons, and valued at £7. ! They were defended by Mr C. S. Thomas. A charge of arson which had been preferred against them on Wednesday —when a remand was granted was withdrawn. According to Detective Sergeant Connolly about 9 p.m. on Tuesday last the Fire Brigade received a call to Waller and Sons timber yards in Tuam Street, where a small quantity of timber was on fire. After the flames were extinguished a quantity of kapoo was found at the seat of the lire. The police went into the adjoining premises, the Wellington Hotel, and in one of the rooms found the accused. The men on being questioned said a mattress had caught fire while they were smoking on the bed and they had thrown it out of a window. The mattress had fallen into the timber yard and caused small damage through fire. The Magistrate (Mr H. Y. Widdowson) : Can you show me any authority that that was wilful P The proprietor of the timber yard inay be able to recover civilly. Detective Sergeant Connolly: They were reckless. The Magistrate: Did they know there was a timber yard there for a start? Detective Sergeant Connolly : They did not care. Ernest Waller, timber merchant, said the damage through the fire was very slight. Mr .C. Evans, licensee of the Wellington Hotel, said that when the police called at the hotel to investigate lie accompanied them to the room where Erridge and Smith were. Smith W,as underneath the bed. He was sober. Erridge was sort of dazed with drink. Smith was not a hoarder at the hotel. Mr Thomas: You don’t ask us to believe that Smith was lying under the bed perfectly sober. Tt was not until we were about to leave that we discovered there was a man under the bed,” said Sergeant ± acker, in describing the visit to the room. “When J asked Smith what he was doing under the bed he said he was iTightened, but he couldn’t sav what frightened him.” The Magistrate: He might have been frightened of you. Sergeant Packer said Erridge was not occuj>ying his proper room. The piace in which lie and Smith had gathered was an internal room to which there was no window. When the mattress caught fire it had to be taken along a passage to another room in older to get it outside. They had a flask of whisky and a bottle of beer and there was one beer bottle empty. Mr C. S. Thomas submitted that no offence had been disclosed, though tnere was no question a serious state <1 affairs might have arisen. Tn dismissing the case the Magistrate s-aid that no offence had been committed. It was not enough to say that a man had been reckless. Of course the men would be liable in a civil action and a serious fire might have been caused, which went to show how careful people should be. With regard to the hotel it appeared that Smith had been about the premises from 10 o’clock in the morning. He had evidently bought the two bottles of beer and the flask of whisky, which cost 12s 3d altogether, and they had gone up* into the room to have a good time. The Magistrate said that he was not at all satisfied with the conduct of the licensee of- the hotel in connection with the case, and it showed on the face of it that he was not exercising proper supervision. The matter should liebrought under the notice of the Licensing Committee by the police in then next report.