AMAZING DIVORCE CASE

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XIX, Issue 300, 4 December 1929, Page 7

AMAZING DIVORCE CASE

LASTS SEVEN WEEKS: COSTS £lO,OOO. SUITS DISMISSED, (United Preu A esociatlon— By CableCopyright., (Received 4, 12.55 p.m.) Sydney, Dec. 4. A tangled divorce case which lasted seven weeks, the costs totalling front £BOOO to £lO,OOO, ended with the parties as they were at the beginning. Tom St. Aubine Bakewell sought a divorce from Mary Gwendoline Bakawell, formerly Bruell, nee Cantwell, on the ground of misconduct with a former husband (Bruell) and another. Mrs. Bakewell denied the charge but alleged that her husband had misconducted himself and claim, ed judicial separation on that ground. The judgment traversed the strange history of the couple’s marital relationships. In 1921 Mrs. Bakewell, then Mrs. Bruell, sought a divorce from Bruell. The suit was undefended and the decree granted but the Crown intervened and the decree was rescinded because it was shown that false evidence had been given, also that at the time the petition was filed Mrs. Bruell was living with Bakewoll. her present husband. Three years late Bruell was granted on the grounds of his wife’s association with Bakewell, who subsequently married her. Mr. Justice Owen’s judgment took an hour and a half to deliver. The case is the longest and most expensive in New South Wales State legal records. The Judge found all the allegations on both sides proved, dismissed the suits and ordered Bakewell to pay his wife’s costs.