APPEAL BY PRISONER.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 230, 28 September 1935, Page 12

APPEAL BY PRISONER.

DID JUDGE ACT WRONGLY? REFUSAL TO STATE A CASE. (By Telegraph.—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, Friday. The Court of Appeal was to-day occupied with the sase of Batchelor versus the King. On February 14, 1034, John Black Batchelor, of Christchurch, was sentenced to four years' imprisonment on a charge of perjury and other charges. In July of the same year an application was made to the Supreme Court by prisoner for a case to be stated for the opinion of the Court of Appeal on certain questions of law arising out of his trial. That application was not disposed of until August of this year, when Mr. Justice Johnston delivered his judgment declining to reserve such questions for the Court of Appeal on the ground that the application was not made to him within the correct period of time. From that judgment Batclielor to-day appealed to the Court of Appeal, and after hearing Mr. E. L. Saunders, of Christchurch, on behalf of prisoner, and the Solicitor-General for the Crown, the Court reserved its judgment.

If the Court decides that Mr. Justice Johnston was wrong in refusing to state a- case upon the ground taken by him, then it will proceed to deal with the whole question on its merits.