Accused Gives Evidence Of 111-Treatment

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30192, 25 July 1963, Page 19

Accused Gives Evidence Of 111-Treatment

(New Zealand Press Association) r PALMERSTON NORTH, July 24. 111-treatment of herself and her two children by her husband was alleged by June Laura Chamberlain, aged 29, when she gave evidence in the Supreme Court, Palmerston North, today, where she is appearing on a charge of murder. She was alleged intentionally to have shot her husband, Joseph Henry Chamberlain, a carpenter, aged 33, in their double-unit State house at 46 Vogel street on the night of May 31.

Addresses to the jury by counsel for the defence (Mr H. Y. Gilliand) and the Crown prosecutor (Mr J. A. Ongley) occupied this afternoon. Mr Justice Haslam presided. He will address the jury tomorrow morning. From the witness box, Mrs Chamberlain said she went into an orphanage at the age of six until she returned home for a short time at 12. Her home was not a happy one. and was made unhappy by her father. She then went into another home, where she remained until she married her husband at the age of 19. They had two children, Christine, nine, and Jacqueline, five.

Her husband had owned a car for four years, but had no licence to drive, so she used to drive him on all occasions. The children also went with them, but the outings were not happy ones, because the children dared not go near him.

Her husband generally had been violent and had beaten her with a shovel, hearth broom, or anything handy. His language had been foul. The coming of the children into their married life had not improved matters. “Used His Boot”

When violent, her husband disregarded the presence of other persons. Sometimes he used his boot on the children, and nagged on and on about anything which displeased him. On the occasion when the neighbour, Stevens, remonstrated with her husband on his language, one of the children, aged four, had lost one of his scrapers and could not remember where she had put it. Her husband hit the child with a stick, and when she went into the house he dragged her out, kicking her all the way to the garage. The animosity against the child continued all that day.

and in the early hours of next morning the child awoke screaming: “I don’t know where it is, daddy.” On another occasion her husband was very annoyed when she lost her way on a family outing to Himatangi, so he grabbed his daughter, Christine, by the back of the neck and bumped her face on the dashboard, breaking several of her front teeth. She herself broke down and could drive no further. “Became Annoyed” Then he became very annoyed through getting wet on Labour Day. In the house he told accused that Christine should not be out in the rain and would receive a hiding when she returned. When accused pleaded for the child her father said: “Would you like one.” “I said it wouldn’t make any difference, as an extra hiding would not matter,” said accused. “He then gave me a hiding with the buckle end of a belt. After that I had to wear black stockings to my work at the hospital, so that people would not notice. At the hospital I showed the bruises to several persons I knew well.” Witness described how she and her brother had met her husband after he had been shooting at Ashhurst. Her husband had raised his gun and shook it at her, complaining of her having had liquor and threatened: “If you come back like that in my car there is one up the spout for you.” On the way back her brother stopped the ear and remonstrated with him. Later, at home, he came into the kitchen for a facecloth because her brother in the front room had struck him. The deceased left the house and was finally located in one of the flats at the rear of the shops opposite their house. He was too scared to come home, but was assured by witness and her brother

that he would come to no harm.

“My husband asked me if I Liked seeing me beaten up. and I said, ’yes, becuase you now know how I feel when you beat me up.’ My husband’s behaviour improved after my brother hit him. He still hit the children, but only nagged at me.” Searched For Forms

Describing the events on the night of May 31, accused said her husband had searched for the old income-tax form to see if he could get some money out of the Income Tax Department. Being disgruntled, he did not have any tea. In the front room he kept nagging at her about the papers. She told him to shut up, she w’as sick of it He then kicked her on the shin, which he said w’ould teach her to leave his papers alone. Accused then said she had had a “guts full” and would leave home on the following Tuesday. This was overheard by the daughter Christine, w'ho told Jacqueline in the kitchen. Christine said she would go with her father and Jacqueline chose to remain with her mother.

After Jacqueline had been put to bed, there was a further discussion about leaving. When accused w'ent into the bedroom to pull back the bedspread she could still hear her husband muttering in the bathroom that she would get more than a kick one the shins the next time £he touched his personal papers. She then felt she had had enough, reached for the gun and cartridges, took them to the kitchen and then returned to the passage. She did not know whether the safety-catch was on or off, but her husband happened to hear it as she moved it ‘‘for something to touch." He had turned and said:

“Don’t be a fool.” putting his arm up as he did so. It was then that she “let fly.” She saw blood on his arm and knew that she had hurt him.

It W’as not in her mind that such a tragedy would strike her home. She had never used a gun before. When she went into the bedroom she felt that she could not take any more—she had had enough. Something seemed to snap inside her. She had put the cartridge in the gun because she wanted to frighten him, and if he thought it was not loaded he would have taken it from her and given her a hiding ■ “I wanted the power to frighten him as he had to frighten me,” said accused. Accused said she had not left her husband earlier because she had nowhere to go with the two children and she thought that the house was her home as well as his, and why should she get out. She did not want her children to live in an orphanage.

Manslaughter Submission Addressing the jury, Mr Gilliand said the defence was not asking for sympathy, but had, by means of witnesses, provided a background against which accused’s actions could be judged. The defence submitted the occurrence was not murder and asked for a verdict of manslaughter. The defence was based on the points that accused had not meant to kill her husband, and that there was sufficient provocation to deprive an ordinary person of the power of selfcontrol and induce that person to commit homicide. The humiliation and degradation of the accused over the years had been amply established by disinterested witnesses. Mr Ongley said that to reduce the charge of murder to one of manslaughter would involve the belief that accused intended only to frighten her husband. The trial was not one of the rights or wrongs of the matrimonial life of the parties but provocation could be established only after the intentional nature of the act of shooting. There was doubt whether the events of the evening were such as to cause the accused to lose all selfcontrol in the heat of the moment.