A LICENSE ENDORSED.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XIV, Issue 830, 1 February 1906, Page 25

A LICENSE ENDORSED.

The licensee of the Fitzroy Hotel, George Taylor, was charged at the Police Court last week, before Mr. Kettle, S.M., with selling liquor on his premises on December 25 last (Christmas Day) within prohibited hours. Mr. S. Mays, on behalf of the Crown Prosecutor, prosecuted, and Mr. McVeigh appeared for the defendant, who pleaded guilty. Mr. McVeigh pleaded for the Bench to take a lenient view of the case, as the offence was committed on Christmas Day, and not on a Sunday. There was a sort of religious sentiment attaching to an offence committed on Sunday. He asked that the license should not be endorsed.

In reply to Mr. Kettle, Mr. McVeigh said the defendant did not wish to give evidence to plead any extenuating circumstances. Mr. Kettle said it did not matter whether the offence took place on a Sunday, after ten o clock on a week night, or at any other time. There was no justification for the offence. The defendant declined to go into the box to give evidence to explain the circumstances, and he (Mr. Kettle) took the refusal to mean that he was not in a position to advance evidence. In these cases he always liked hotelkeepers to go into the witness-box and say if there were any extenuating circumstances. The fact of the offence having been committed on Christmas Day was no more extenuating than if it had taken place on any other day. The defendant had also declined to state this was an isolated case. Mr. Kettle concluded: “It is only fair to the other hotelkeepers who keep the licensing laws that offences of this kind should be severely dealt with. In businesses of this kind it is grossly unfair to other hotelkeepers who try to keep the law that defendant should make money behind their backs by carrying on the trade when others have their bars closed.” The defendant was fined £5 and costs, and the license was ordered to be endorsed. A second case against Taylor for supplying liquor to David John Silvester, also on Christmas Day, was withdrawn.