DANGERS IN CHILDREN’S EVIDENCE

Evening Star, Issue 19894, 16 June 1928, Page 2

DANGERS IN CHILDREN’S EVIDENCE

JURY TAKES JUDGE’S ADVICE [Pee United Press Association.] HAMILTON, June 15. In a case in which a middle-aged man named Jeremiah O’Connell, a farmer at Kopaki, was charged with assaulting a girl five and a-half years of age, for whose father he had previously worked, Mr Justice Blair cautioned tho jury that it would bo exceedingly dangerous for it to convict on the uncorroborated evidence of a girl of eight regarding offences which allegedly took place three years before. The judge expressed the opinion from tho manner in which the girl gave her evidence that her story was probably the outcome of imagination, or that it had been prompted by somebody who bore O’Connell a grudge. A doctor had stated that the girl’s present condition must have been the result of interference in the past six months at the very longest. Furthermore, the girl had related certain incidents which allegedly occurred in the bathroom, whereas it had , been proved beyond doubt that the bathroom was not built until at least twelve months after the prisoner had given up living there. A verdict of not guilty was returned.