BRAUMAN ON TRIAL.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 257, 30 October 1929, Page 10

BRAUMAN ON TRIAL.

"KILLING NOT DISPUTED." WAS THERE PROVOCATION 1 EVIDENCE FOR PROSECUTION. (By Telegraph. —Tress Association.) DUNEDIN, this day. William Henry Brauman is on trialin the Supreme Court on a charge of murdering his wife, Annabelle Dorothy Deans Brauman, at St. Clair, on August 7. Accused, who is defended by Messrs. White and Lloyd, appears to have recovered from his injuries, and pleaded not guilty in a steady voice. He was allowed to sit in the dock. There are 30 witnesses. The Crown stood down two jurors, and the defence made live challenges. Mr. Adams, the Crown Prosecutor, said the crime was a brutal and savage one. Brauman shot his wife with a revolver placed against her ear, and'he then attempted to commit suicide, but the jury need not consider that, because there might be a separate charge. It was open on the indictment to find a verdict of manslaughter, but the facts would oiler no proper grounds for such an action. "Harboured the Scheme." Mr. Adams declared there was no provocation upon which accused might have acted on a sudden impulse. The evidence would show that accused harboured the scheme in his mind for some time. It was true that accused alleged his wife was acting improperly with another man at the moment, but the facts were that she had been out in a motor with two men and her daughter. They had just alighted, near St. Clair baths, when the dee'd was done, and nothing had occurred to which exception could be taken. Accused said his daughter "cuddled" ono man and his wife the other, but that was an after-thought, to give colour to the suggestion that he acted on the spur of the moment.

Mr. Adams then read a letter (published in another column) written by Brauman before lie left Invercargill. He asked the jury to contrast that letter with one written from Invercargill by Brauman to his wife, in which he expressed the hope that Mrs. Brauman would take a sincere view and return home. "What a lovely wife and mother you are/' Brauman wrote on this occasion. "If you could only settle down to solid facts, noble actions and good character defeat all evil minds and tongues."

"A pious aphorism that he might have niade to himself when he was writing this letter," remarked Mr. Adams, as he held up -the "farewell" letter. Three Courses for Jury. 'Mr. Adams emphasised that the case was not a trial of the domestic relations between Brauman and his wife. "It will not be disputed," he said, "that accused killed his wife. The question for you is whether that act of killing is to be dealt with.as murder or*as manslaughter, or whether you will acquit him on the ground of insanity. Those arc the three possible, courses, ai|d only The case for the Crown is that the circumstances do not leave you free to find a verdict of manslaughter and that the facts do not justify a verdict of insanity. It becomes my duty to urge this Tipon you even at this stage of the case.

Evidence was then called, and when the Court adjourned for the day his Honor Sir Alexander Herdman ordered that the jury should remain locked up overnight.