over the suddenly controversial game, a defence lawyer at the illegal lottery trial of two local bingo promoters said yesterday.

And Mr. Richard Hector, who is representing 59-year-old Smith's Parish businessman Neil Inchcup, wondered at the fairness of his client being singled out for prosecution by the Attorney General's Chambers when there were many other community clubs, cruise ships and businesses that continued to sponsor the game.

"Why,'' Mr. Hector asked from his office after the close of yesterday's court session, "is the MarketPlace allowed to air TV bingo over ZBM (television)? "Why are the clubs and the cruise ships permitted to operate bingo games unpersecuted? "Is it because (the authorities) would then have to admit that the clubs were engaging in an illegal activity all along?'' In a protracted legal argument with Senior Magistrate the Wor. Will Francis, Mr. Hector had earlier tried to bring evidence -- including a videotape of a MarketPlace bingo broadcast -- that he said would have shown a clear similarity between the bingo ventures of Inchcup and those of other parties.

Producing a witness -- US bingo consultant Roger Gibson -- who testified that bingo was played by 25 million people a night in the US and five-and-a-half million people a night in Britain, he also tried to establish that the Island's liquor licensing authority has frequently sanctioned bingo on a number of licensed properties and that the public definition of gambling had changed dramatically since the Lotteries Act that Inchcup is accused of violating was adopted in 1944.

Inchcup, who operates the Freeport Gardens bingo parlour at Dockyard, is charged with operating an unlawful lottery there, of allowing a multi-purpose room at the Clocktower Mall for the purposes of a lottery and of conducting a prohibited lottery with the DeFontes Broadcasting Company by airing a series of Freeport TV bingo games over VSB television on October 22.

On Wednesday, Mr. Hector petitioned the judge to have Inchcup's name deleted from the TV-related charge on the ground that the Crown had failed to produce any "admissible evidence that links him with the showing of TV bingo'' in October.

While Inchcup was acquitted of the charge late yesterday, Mr. Hector was less successful in convincing the judge that the activities of other alleged lottery operators were a pertinent factor in the case.

"How bingo is played in other places is not relevant to the matter before me,'' Mr. Francis ultimately decided. "I (also) rule that the (MarketPlace videotape) is irrelevant.'' In dismissing Mr. Hector's primary argument, the magistrate was also dismissing his related points. He asserted: "I don't see that I as a judge have to think one way because a lot of other people think that way. What I have to do is interpret any `mischief' that may exist -that's what I have to do.'' By the end of the day, the only aspects of Gibson's testimony that were allowed by Mr. Francis included his qualifications as an expert on bingo and his description of the visits he had paid to the clubs and cruise ships in Bermuda that effectively operate bingo games.

At one point in yesterday's testimony, Gibson, who was the sole witness of the day, also suggested that he might sue the Labour and Home Affairs Ministry for granting him permission to perform a job that the Attorney General's Chambers later declared illegal.

Mr. Hector, meanwhile, will proceed with his case this morning.

Last night, the lawyer told The Royal Gazette that he would be sending the MarketPlace video and other evidence to the Commissioner of Police for study.