A DOUBLE DESERTER

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXII, Issue 19436, 23 October 1925, Page 7

A DOUBLE DESERTER

CABARET OWNER OBTAINS JUDGMENT. [Per Press Association.] WELLINGTON, Oct. 22. Mr. W. G. Riddell, S.M., in his reserved decision, delivered to-day, in the cabaret case, Campbell v. Miller, in which tho proprietress of a city cabaret claimed £5O damages from 8. L. Miller, a deserter from tho United States warship Oklahama, gave judgment for plaintiff for £lO. Plaintiff engaged tho defendant and six others as band musicians to play at her c.aba* ret in Wellington at a salary of £5O pet week. The agreement provided that plaintiff could terminiate the service! of the band or tiny of its members of seven days’ .notice, but members of the band could not terminate their engagement under three months’ notice. Defendant and other members of the band were deserters from the United States navy. Defendant entered plaintiff’s employment on August 29 and left on September 21 without notice. Defendant pleaded infancy as a special defence and that the contract was void because it was a contract to employ seamen -who had deserted from a for- ■ eign ship, and was therefore a breach of Section 39 of the Shipping and Seamen’s Act, 1908. The Magistrate held that defendant had not proved he wai under 21 years of age. There was n< proof that plaintiff induced the defendant to desert from his ship, but she knew he was a deserter. However, the provisions of the Shipping land Seamen’s Act dealing with deserters from foreign ships was not applicable in the case of a naval deserter.