PETERSFIELD.]—PETTY SESSIONS, TUESDAY.—Before the Hon. J. J. Carnegie.
Damaging Trees.—Fanny Voller was convicted, on the evidence of P.C. Charles Stone, of wilfully damaging certain fir trees in the parish of Bramshott, the property of Mrs. Harriett. Fined 9s., including damage and costs.
Damaging a Registration Book.—Thomas Amey, a farmer living at Steep, appeared to answer a charge of damaging a registration book. Defendant was charged, at the last Petty Sessions, with assaulting Mr. Ebenezer Durman, the registrar of births and deaths for district No. 2 of the Petersfield Union, and the case, after being partly heard, was adjourned at the urgent request of defendant, to enable him to obtain legal assistance. Defendant, however, conducted his own case, as on the former occasion. Although the assault and the wilful damage formed two distinct charges, they both arose out of the same transaction, and in consequence of the adjournment of the assault case, the other charge stood over also. To-day, there being only one magistrate present, the wilful damage case came on first. The following is the evidence: —Ebenezer Durman deposed: I am registrar of births and deaths for district No. 2 of the Petersfield Union. On the 6th of December last, I attended at the house of Thomas Amey, of Steep, which is within my district, for the purpose of registering the birth of his child. This was about four o’clock in the afternoon. I had the registration book with me, and produced it to defendant’s wife. I had partly registered the birth, and Mrs. Amey had written her Christian name to the entry, but before she had written her surname, Amey came into the room, and took the book forcibly from me, and threw it out of the door. It was raining fast at the time, and the book fell into the water. I picked it up; it was very wet and dirty, and the entry was smeared. Defendant opened the back door violently, came up to me, and in a menacing attitude pointed with one hand almost close to my face, and with the other to the door, which was wide open.—Cross-examined by defendant: There is a covered place outside the door, but the book went beyond that, and fell into the water.—Defendant: How came you in my house?—Your little girl opened the door, and let me in.—Defendant then, referring to his ‟brief,” addressed the Bench in defence, and said he should be able to prove, by the testimony of a highly respectable witness, that the door was so situated that it was quite impossible that he could have thrown the book outside the door into the wet, as Mr. Durman had described. He produced a ground plan of the house, and called Henry Kelsey, who said: I live at Steep, and am a wheelwright. I was not present at Mr. Amey’s on the 6th of December.—Defendant was proceeding to question witness as to the position of the door, &c., when the magistrate reminded him that such evidence could not possibly serve his case. It had been distinctly sworn by complainant that he (defendant) did violently seize the book, and throw it out of the door, and that fact could only be rebutted by bringing evidence that he (complainant) was not a person who ought to be believed on his oath.—Mr. Durman, on being re-called, explained to his Worship the manner in which the book was thrown.—The Magistrate, after a partial hearing of the case, convicted the defendant of the offence, and adjudged him to pay the costs, 7s. 6d., the damage, which was laid at 1d., and a fine of 10s. The charge of assault was withdrawn.