SUPREME COURT Acquitted On Charge Of Threatening To Kill

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31597, 7 February 1968, Page 10

SUPREME COURT Acquitted On Charge Of Threatening To Kill

A 34-year-old Hungarian textile worker, Jim Zoltan Somlay, stood trial in the Supreme Court yesterday charged with threatening, during a telephone conversation, to kill a young widow—a conversation which Somlay, in evidence, denied had ever taken place. The complainant, Dawn Theresa Cully, gave evidence that Somlay who she said had not accepted her breaking-off of an association between them, had telephoned her on the morning of July 19 last, and on being told, as on previous occasions, to stop telephoning her, had said: “All right, I’ll kill you.” Somlay (Mr R. G. Blunt), in evidence in his own defence; admitted that he had telephoned Mrs Cully that morning, but said he had said no more than “Hullo” before being cut off, presumably when Mrs Cully recognised his voice.

He said further that he had telephoned Mrs Cully twice that afternoon, the second time pausing to let her answer first, and had told her (in response to a previous request) that he had won a $520 judgment in a law-suit, whereupon she had told him: “Get your money and get out of New Zealand before I put you out.” The jury, after Mr Blunt had inquired whether they could accept Mrs Cully’s word against Somlay’s beyond reasonable doubt, acquitted Somlay of the charge of threatening to kill her, having deliberated for 30 minutes. Mr Justice Wilson ordered that Somlay be discharged. Further Evidence Mrs Cully gave further evidence, corroborated by a companion, Ngaire Elizabeth Beetham. a widow, that while driving from Wainoni into the city on the evening of July 19, Somlay had passed their car after signalling to them, and then followed it to the Fitzgerald Avenue-Cashel Street traffic lights, where he got out of his car, opened their door, and said to Mrs Cully: “Why didn’t you ston? I wanted to talk to you. I’ll get you for this.” Mr Blunt, in his defence address to the jury, said that the latter remark—which Somlay

denied—was not important, and irrelevant to the morning telephone call, which was the subject of the charge, the alleged threat: “I’ll kin you.” It came down to Mrs Cully’s word about that against Somlay’s—and could the jury accept her word beyond reasonable doubt?

The Crown Prosecutor (Mr N. W. Williamson) suggested that the jury would prefer Mrs Cully’s evidence to the accused’s as being “less definite and dogmatic.” According to the accused, it was he, not she, who had broken off their association, and she, not he, who had signalled while driving on Pages Road. Was this really likely? His Honour, in the course of summing up, warned the jury that it must put aside any prejudice against the accused as a foreigner. As a foreigner, he especially required the protection of an impartial court.