11 Misc. 651 | The Superior Court of New York City | 1895
The complaint and affidavits show that the plaintiff herein owns and carries on a billiard saloon, in which billiards are played by any persons resorting thereto, the public being invited and afforded facilities for playing billiards at the plaintiff’s establishment upon the payment of the hire or fee for the use of the paraphernalia of the game; that the plaintiff has kept his billiard room open on Sunday, and has heretofore twice been arrested for the alleged violation of section 265 of the Penal Code, which forbids sports on Sunday ; that in both cases the plaintiff has been discharged on habeas corpus; that the defendants, the police commissioners, and their superintendent of police threaten and intend to continue to arrest the plaintiff if he continues to allow billiard and pool playing in his billiard saloon on Sunday; that because of said threats plaintiff has been injured in his business to the amount of $500. The plaintiff, therefore, asks judgment against the defendants in the sum of $500, and that the defendants be restrained from interfering with the conduct, management and opening by the plaintiff, and those similarly situated, of a hall, place or premises to which parties or persons may come and play pool or billiards on paying to the plaintiff, or to others similarly situated, the rental for tables and other paraphernalia of the game.
•" To play billiards on the Sabbath in the privacy o.f .one’s- own house is one thing; to keep open an establishment to which any person paying the fee may gain admittance certainly gives it the character of a public place within the meaning of that- term. See People v. Bixby, 67 Barb. 221. The interference complained of seems to be directed to these places of
Motion for injunction denied.