“PERFECT ALIBI”

Greymouth Evening Star, 19 March 1941, Page 2

“PERFECT ALIBI”

MAN SAVED FROM GALLOWS. The word “alibi” has been so misused lately, owing to the influence of American films, that we are in danger of forgetting what it really means, states a London journal. It does not mean an excuse, as the Americans seem to think, but is derived from the Latin meaning “elsewhere,” and is one of the best defences possible to a criminal charge. If the accused was not on the spot where the crime was committed at the time it was committed, it stands to reason that he must be acquitted, unless the prosecution can break down the alibi and prove that it was faked or fabricated. For this reason the best criminal advocates are chary of using an alibi unless it is absolutely unbreakable. If it is not, the whole defence falls to pieces, and the mere fact that the alibi has been proved false tells heavily against the prisoner. If he is innocent —the jury ask themselves —why did he trouble to invent an alibi? The criminal classes have always a crowd of faithful pals who are willing to perjure themselves in order to convince the jury that the accused was somewhere else at the time, but if counsel for the Crown knows his business, he can nearly always tear a faked alibi to pieces, unless it is cleverly put together. A genuine alibi has, in some sensational murder cases, saved an innocent man from the gallows. There was the Cannon Street murder, for instance. The man arrested and charged was positively identified by several witnesses for the prosecution. But his counsel triumphantly brought forward several people who had seen the prisoner playing cards in an inn at Eton at the time the killing was done in London-

Then there was the Gorse Hall murder. Sundry witnesses swore that they had actually seen the accused man break into the house of Mr. Storrs—Gorse Hall, near Dewsbury—and shoot him with a gun. But the defence put up an equally numerous and respectable array who testified that he was elsewhere at the hour of the crime. The jury chose to believe them, and the accused walked out a free man. Sometimes an awkward dilemma confronts a prisoner. He can prove an alibi—but what an alibi! He can only uphold it by admitting that he was engaged in another offence elsewhere! It has paid a prisoner to confess to a minor crime rather than run the risk of being convicted of a greater one, perhaps murder.