Japanese Maybrick Case.

Hastings Standard, Issue 323, 15 May 1897, Page 4

Japanese Maybrick Case.

FINAL PHASES OF THE TRIAL. (Dunedin Star Correspondent). London, March 12. With the arrival of the mail from Japan we are able to dot the i's and and cross the t's of the lamentable story of the poisoning of Mr Carew by his wife. When the cablegrams announcing the conviction of the latter came to hand we were roundly assured by experts that 110 English or colonial Court could be more satisfactory in character, formation, and procedure than the Consular one which deals with criminal cases at treaty ports, &c. The full details do not, however, give this impression at all. Few things more scandalous than the reasonless and most unjustifiable arrest of Miss Jacob in the middle of Mrs Carew's trial have ever been heard of. The Yokohama correspondent of the Daily News writes:— From the commencement is was clear that the evidence in the trial was very strong against Mrs Carew. Still, the defence was sanguine, and it was bruited abroad that a trump card would be played that would effectively establish her innocence in the eyes of the jury. The card was played, but it damaged instead of assisting Mrs Carew's cause. It consisted of the arrest of Miss Jacob, the nursery governess, which was accomplished on a Sunday. Mr Lowder, counsel for the defence, brought the charge in a private capacity, but what was extraordinary was that, although Mr Lowder was acting in-a private capacity, Mr Troup, the Consul who issued the warrant, allowed Miss Jacob's box which had been seized, to be taken away to Mr Lowder's apartments, and there searched by him without the presence of any official witness. The charge was that Miss Jacob was the writer of the Annie Luke letters, and that she, therefore, stood confessed the murderess of Mr Carew, and, as a motive, it was hinted that her relations with the deceased were improper. Great indignation was excited at this arrest and the charge, and the summary methods adopted towards Miss Jacob as contrasted with the laxness of the Consular officials in their treatment of Mrs Carew when suspicion first rested on her. Mrs Carew's boxes were not searched, nor the house sealed, nor any of the precautions taken which are usual when the authorities have reason to suspect that a murder has been committed. Public sympathy was in Miss Jacob's favor, and a few influential residents not only came forward to offer bail, but privately subscribed a fund to furnish her with legal assistance in her defence. That fund is now a public one, being to-day advertised. Its guarantors subscribed 1230d01, and it is safe to say that

within a week the total will reach many times that amount. For, and in of the seizure of the box and of Mrs Carew coming forward to give evidence—her own trial being adjourned for that purpose —there was not a shred of evidence produced incriminating Miss Jacob in any way, or at all suggestive of improper relations with anyone. The jury in Mrs Carew's trial were at first puzzled by the announcement of the fact of Miss Jacob's arrest, but they showed how little it affected them by bringing in a verdict of " Guilty " against Mrs Carew while Miss Jacob was still under charge. Miss Jacob suffered much in health, becoming delirious ; yet Mr Lowder, when he withdrew the charge, did not attempt to offer any apology or to express regret in any way. Mr Troup, actingjas Consul, has given to Miss Jacob a certificate that the charge which came before him as AssistantJudge has been withdrawn, and that no imputation whatever rests upon Mary -Jacob. She leaves the court without a stain, and she will leave Yokohama, as she is to do shortly, with a very substantial recognition of what the opinion of the community is with regard to the treatment she has received. In a former letter I summarised the evidence given at the preliminary proceedings and the inquest. At the trial that evidence was practically repeated, there being no new features, except that Mr Mason, a teacher in the Japanese Government Service, came forward as an expert in handwriting and swore that the Annie Luke letters were in Mrs Carew's handwriting, the disguise being a poor one. Enlarged photographs of the letters emphasised characteristics pointed out by Mr Mason, and there is no doubt that the jury came to a very conclusive opinion on the matter. These letters were the ones in which a mysterious visitor named Annie Luke was supposed to write to Mrs Carew, to Mr Lowder, and to the coroner, stating that she had waited eight years for her revenge, and that, having bamboozled the doctor, the chemist, and " that silly little fool his wife," she was going to join her " twin soul." Another feature of the evidence was Mr Dickinson having to read, in the witness box, his own love letters to Mrs Carew, which Miss Jacob had found in the waste-paper basket. There was a great conflict of medical testimony—Drs Divers, Wheeler, Todd, and May declaring that in their opinion the deceased met his death through the administration of Fowler's solution of arsenic, and those for the defence (Drs Eldridge, Baelz, and Munro) giving it as their belief that the white arsenic and the sugar of lead found in the stomach must also have contributed to the deceased's death, though admitting that death might have been due to Fowler's solution alone. The bulk of the evidence for the defence, with the exception of the medical testimony, was directed to proving that the late Mr Carew was a confirmed arsenic-eater ; but as most of the evidence referred to a period of one or two years ago, and proof could not be given of his ever having purchased any arsenic at Yokohama, little weight was placed on this evidence either by judge or jury. The Judge's summing up was strongly against the prisoner. It was not denied, he pointed out, that three ounces of Fowler's solution had been purchased by Mrs Carew, and the other one, as to which there were so many conflicting statements, was purchased at the same time a bottle of chloral hydrate was purchased, which bottle Mrs Carew herself brought into court. The four ounces were bought between the 17th and 22nd of October, the deceased dying on the latter date, and no addiction to the arsenic habit would account for the consumption voluntarily of such a quantity within so brief a space of time. He also referred to the discrepancy in the accused's own statement, she at one time saying that her husband took small quantities of arsenic, and subsequently that he was a great consumer of it, taking a large dose after breakfast as a " pick-me-up." At the conclusion of the summing-up the jury retired, returning after thirty minutes' interval with a verdict of " Guilty."