WITNESSES TACTICS.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XVII, Issue 994, 25 March 1909, Page 20

WITNESSES TACTICS.

The tactics adopted by witnesses in sly-grog cases have always come in for condemnation. At Christchurch last week this was no exception to the rule when at the Magistrate’s Court, Ella Regan, a coloured woman, with three or four previous convictions, was convicted for selling liquor without a license and sentenced to six months’ hard labour.

Herbert Anderson, who occupied the same house as Regan, was fined £5O o.i a similar charge. The Magistrate, in giving judgment, said:—“ The fewer words I use the better, for the case is a most disgusting one to every decent person. I am go.ng to break up what I consider the black spot of the city.” In regard to the characters of witnesses and the methods adopted by them, his Worship said he could not speak of that aspect of the matter at all. It seemed that it was no doubt necessary for the police to sometimes employ men of that class, and they must therefore be regarded as a necessary evil in cases of this sort. Sub-Inspector McGrath, after the case had been heard, told an “ Evening News” reporter that the police knew nothing of the tactics adopted by witnesses, and would not have countenanced their action had they known of it.