DEFENCE CASE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 142, 17 June 1936, Page 8

DEFENCE CASE.

MEDICAL EVIDENCE. ATTACK BY COUNSEL MR. O'LEART CONCLUDES. t Having opened his address to the jury just before noon, Mr. O'Leary concluded at 4.35 yesterday afternoon. At that hour Mr. Meredith announced that he would make some preliminary observations before the Court rose for the day. The continuation of Mr. " O'Leary's address is summarised below: — Resuming his address after the luncheon adjournment, Mr. O'Leary turned to evidence as to whether Mrs. Marco was a drinker. Marco had said that he thought his wife was "canned" when he saw her seriously ill, and it was to show that he had not been lying that evidence had been called regarding drinking habits. Could the jury doubt that Mrs. Mareo did at times drink to excess ?

It was remarkable, counsel said, how Miss Stark had endeavoured to close up all possibilities 011 the facts. Enthusiasm for the Crown case, Mr. O'Leary thought, had made her views exaggerated. Medical Witnesses Attacked. It was remarkable, counsel continued, how Dr. Gilmour had similarly closed up all possibilities in the medical evidence. Attacking the Crown medical witnesses in general, counsel said that not one of the three doctors had listened to Graham Marco's evidence. It was the duty of experts to draw conclusions from all the evidence. It was claimed by counsel that the statement of Crown medical witnesses that a person who came out of a coma never relapsed without a further dose of veronal was not universally accepted. Counsel contended that Dr. Giesen's evidence had not been challenged by the Crown for the reason that it was irrefutable.

Turning to thq theory of the defence. Mr. O'Leary briefly reviewed the evidence that had been called. He paid a compliment to those people who had come forward voluntarily. Dealing with the witness Whitington, counsel asked the jury to consider what this witness had done when he read an account of the opening of the first trial. He had consulted a lawyer, and theil the police, after communicating with Mr. O'Leary. Counsel asked the jury if they had any doubt as to his evidence that Mrs. Mareo was a veronal-taker. The Fatal Dose. "We contend that there was an automatic taking of veronal by Mrs. Mareo on the Saturday morning," continued counsel. "It was quite possible for her to have gone to the washhouse where the veronal was kept in a suitcase while Mareo was having his bath. On the other hand it may have been that she liad some veronal in the bedroom. In any case, there is no certainty as to •what time on the Saturday morning Mrs. Mareo had the veronal, but Mareo was out of the house during the morning and hifi wife was alone for two hours or more. And the defence submission is that Mrs. Mareo on the Saturday morning took a dose from which she died." References' was next made by Mr. O'Leary to the evidence of Mrs. Meis- ; sner, tiic Ifawkc's Bay witness, who told of her automatic taking of veronal. If Mrs. Meissner had died, would not her husband have been in exactly the same position as Mareo was to-day 7 Counsel reviewed the evidence of Dr. Giesen and the opinion that the water, milk and sal volatile had begun the dissolution and absorption of veronal lying undissolved in the stomach. The evidence of the defence witnesses, contended counsel, indicated a more reasonable probability in the defence theory. In his concluding remarks to the jury Mr. O'Leary held that the only possible verdict on the evidence was one of not guilty.