FRENZY OF FEAR

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 12902, 1 July 1936, Page 4

FRENZY OF FEAR

DAUGHTER SHOOTS FATHER. THE KIWI TRAGEDY. GIRL CHARGED \YITH MURDER. MAGISTRATE DISMISSES THE information JURY WOULD NOT CONVICT. (Press Association).. NELSON, Juno 30. The charge of murder against the fifteen-year-old girl, Agnes F. Caldwell, who shot her father, Joseph Caldwell, dead in the kitchen of their home at Kiwi on June 16 was dismissed by the Magistrate (Mr. Maunsell) who said he believed acciuittal by a jury was certain. Mrs. Christina Caldwell, widow *,f the deceased, said her married life had been unhappy, because of her husband’s conduct.. He had abused her on the morning of June 16: At 9.30 o’clock, she was having breakfast with Jier late husband and her daughter. Her husband noticed that sheep had go'- into the turnips ami he sent Agnes to put.them out. She had had some difficulty in getting them out and her husband became angry. He told witness that; ; f Agnes did not get them out, ne would help her with his fists. He called witness and his daughter a .pair oi lazy and she replied that lie should not expect a girl' to do the same as he did. Agnes got the sheep through after a bit of trouble. Her husband next threw a dessert spoon at witness, and she threw it back. He approached witness and she tried to get away from him. She left the dining room and went into the kitchen. He caught hold of her and tried to hit her head against the chimney bricks, whereupon she screamed to her daughter to come to her help. Agnes was then in the diningroom. "Witness tried to scratch her husband’s face.and the-next thing she heard a shot fired. Her husband was struggling with her at the time and her head was down. He . was facing her. She looked up alter the firing of the shot. She did not then see her daughter, - but heard her scream. She thought the . shot came from outside .at the moment.: sue remembered seeing her husband fall. She asked Agnes whether she hal fired the shot and she said “I did.” She said that she had fired it just to frighten her father. Witness was so terrified that morning that, she thought her husband was goifig to oarrv into effect his threat to kill her. She nearly always bore marks o! her husband’s ill-treatment-. For a long period, her husband had a loaded gun by liim at night and a butcher s knife beneath his pillow. Reginald Charles Ricketts, farmer. Kiwi, a neighbour of the Caldwell-, said that he heard the shot and went te the house. TV itness knew tuc deceased used to heat his wife and had an insane temper.

Herbert - James Duncan, a railway , employee, said that he was passing tb© Caldwell’s house on a jigger, when Agnes stopped him and called “Come and help us. Dad s thrashing mum. As he apuroaehed the girl said ‘ I c shot dad.” Sergeant W. H. Simester produced a statement made by the girl, la her statement, accused detailed the difficulty she had had with the sheep and that her father and shouted at her, saying that lie would help her With his fists. She succeeded in getting the sheep through the fence and. when" she came back, she heard her father “baruying” with her mother. He said that she and witness were a pair of -• She was. liaimg her breakfast, when heard scuffling in the kitchen and a call for hqlp. She looked towards the spare room and saw the rifle standing there and. hardly knowing what she was doing, she took it to the kitchen and fired it off to frighten her father. She saw her father slump back. I his was the first shot she had ever fired out of any gun. She did net recolle - whether she put a cartridge in the rifle or not. She ran out and stopped the men, saying- that- she. had shot her father. Last Christmas, Hi father had threatened to shoot the lot of them and he was ahvaysNlbusing her mother. In dismissing the information the magistrate said: “1 realise the heavy responsibility a magistrate takes m dismissing a murder charge, instead of sending it to a jury. It is. howover, riot without precedent. The i„ the same in a charge of murder as. in any other indictable case. The hearing before me is not a mere matter of form. 1 have to consider whether there is a prima facie, case made out of wilful murder upon which a jury of reasonably minded men could convict, having regard jo the fact that wilful intent to murder must be proved beyond reasonable doubt. The accused girl has given what seems -to be .to be a reasonable account of what happened. Her *K ceased father was a sad case of slu shock .occasioned by., war„ser\ ice, an. hv,-suffered from ungovernable impulses, to violence. He was in the ac of committing a, violent unprovo 'C, assault on his wife. There vm s a loaded rifle in the room and the.gir => statement’ is that .in a- frenzy of - ear that her mother--would be murdered, she had seized: it and fired it solely with the intention of frightening him,.,but shot him accidentally. There is no evidence, whatsoever., t lat n-j story is untrue in any particular, believe, therefore, her acquittal by a jurv. if not by a Grand Jury, is certain ail’d to hold the'Charge-over her head would be a refinement ot cruelty to her and to her mother, jno substantiates . her stateitfgnts. ® police' were in duty hound, to hriUp tho charge'and leave the responsibility to me.., I. jhavc decided ip; ac ccft the responsibility byh dismissing- U charge. If it is any' consolation to the child. I may say I - entirely melieve that what she so frankly, toa Sergeant Simister was the truth. ■ the whole truth and nothing but tup m truth. ‘ . - ’