BIGAMY CHARGE

Greymouth Evening Star, 4 July 1933, Page 10

BIGAMY CHARGE

AN AMAZING DEFENCE. MELBOURNE, June 23. Mr. Justice Wasley told a jury to-day that there had not been such startling developments in the Criminal Court for many years as those which occurred at the trial of William Leslie Edmund Penney, 31, salesman, on a charge of bigamy. Penney was charged under the name, of Billy Edwards, and the Crown Prosecutor (Mr. Book) alleged that he had gone through the ceremony of marriage with a young woman at Trafalgar in August, 1930, while his wife by a previous marriage, which was said to have taken place at Drouin in April, 1930, was living. The trial ended by Mr. Justice Wasley discharging the jury, and remanding Edwards to allow the Crown to investigate his defence. The defence had evoked sharp comments from Mr. Justice Wasley yesterday. Mr. Stretton, who defended Edwards, had declared that the charge must fail, because neither of the marriages referred to by the Crown was lawful, as Edwards had had a prior marriage in 1921, Mr. Justice Wasley would not allow a, certificate, of that marriage to be admitted as evidence, neither would he allow Edwards’s mother to be recalled to testify that the woman whom Edwards was said to have married in 1921 was still alive. When the trial was resumed to-day, however, Mr. Justice Wasley said that he thought that he should allow Edwards’s mother to be recalled. Mr. Stretton had made a slip inadvertent, ly, and he should be allowed to correct it. Mr. Stretton: I have better evidence now. The real wife is here. This woman, called as a witness, said that she had married Edwards in September, 1921, and they had separated after 15 months.