DANCES DISTURBED

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Volume 58, Issue 68, 22 April 1929, Page 5

DANCES DISTURBED

Special to Telegraph.

FIVE YOUTHS CHARGED. F1NES TOTAL SEVEN POUNDS.

AUCKLAND, lliis day. Disturbances at.two dance lialls liad sequels in the Poliee Court wlien live young men were prosecuted 011 suinmonses. "People in the couutry places wlio look iorward to weekly re-unions and Saturday night dances are entitled to have that pleasure, and it has come to a pretty pass if larrikins can fight and cause unpleasaiitness on such occasions,)' said Mr F. K. Hunt, S.M. Allegations of unseemly conducf were made against Albert Edward Butler and Ernest Frank Pratt, wlio were charged with diorderly behaviour m Great North Road. According to the police. defendants went from Henderson to Swanson one evening recently, when a dance was lieing heiu at Swanson. Rivalry betwcen the two townships apparently led to some talk, in which Butler and Pratt were involved. "The affair nearly dcveloped into a frce fight in the street near the dance hall," Sub-Inspcctor McCarthv said. A dance was oue of tlie entertaiunients looked forward to by the country folk, and it was sliameful to tliink that it sliould be spoiled by the conduet of a few youtlis. T11 fining Butler and Pratt £2 eacli, the magistrate said that he agreed with the sub-inspector. Why a eonstable from the central police station had to be sent to M ailieke Island during the week-ends was explained "wlien Alexander Jolm Conway, Bernard Mooro and Frank Leopold Townsend, of Auckland, were charged with wilfully trespassing 111 the Surfdale Hall during the progress of a public dance and after tliey had been warned hy the secretary to leave the hall. After hearing the evidence the magistrate said he was sntisfied that Conway was thc -vhicf oli'ender and thafc Townsend had behaved reasonahlv. Conway was fiiied £2 and Mooi'e £i > wliile the connt against Townsend was dismissed. Costs totalling £6 12s were ordered to he shared betwecn Conway and Moore.