REVENGE ON A FAITHLESS LOVER.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLI, Issue 71, 25 March 1907, Page 3

REVENGE ON A FAITHLESS LOVER.

GIRL'S AMAZING CONFESSION OF

PERJURY

What has every appearance of being a very grave miscarriage of justice, with features that recall in some respects the Beck case, was brought to light at Westminster Police Court on January 26th, in the hearing of a charge of perjury preferred against a young woman named Millie Marsh on her own confession.

The perjury is alleged to have been committed during the trial in November at the Middlesex Sessions of a

commercial tz-aveller named Lewis fluttering a forged cheque. The principal witness against him was the girl Marsh, who swore that she had been with him on the night lie cashed the cheque.

The defendant's counsel attempted to shovv the weakness of her evidence by pointing out its contradictory nature, but the chairman, Sir Ralph Littler, interposed by warning counsel that no one would believe a word of such a defence. Counsel thereupon refused to cross-examine further, as'the chairman's words had, in his opinion, prejudiced the jury, and though Lewis denied all acquaintance with Marsh and produced five witnesses to prove an alibi, he was found guilty and sentenced to three years' penal servitude. The sentence was reduced to fifteen months' in the second division, and the man Is still in gaol. The trial has had an amazing sequel. The girl now states that she testified against Lewis to shield her lover, a man named Brady, who was recently arrested ,on a charge of cheque frauds, and, as Brady had left her, she desired to tell the truth.

The facts of the matter came out at Westminster Police Court on January 26th, when Millie Marsh, a- good-look-ing young woman, described as of Gobian's Farm, Romford, Essex, was charged by order of the Home Office with committing wilful and corrupt perjury in the course of evidence she gave at a trial at the Middlesex Sessions in November last.

Detective-Inspector Pollard, X Division, said the facts were of a remarkable character, and affected two young men, undoubtedly known to each other, named George Etenry William Lewis and Duncan Brady. On a committal from Willesden Police Court the first mentioned was tried before Sir Ralph Littler on November 24 on a charge of uttering a forged cheque to a firm of wine merchants at Kilburn. The girl Marsh was the principal witness against him, and testified that she had -known him some months, that he had been on very intimate terms with her, and that she was with him at Kjlburn the night he passed,the worthless cheque. He was found guilty and sentenced to three years' penal servitude, but the sentence was afterwards reduced to fifteen months^ in the second division, which he is still serving. Quite recently Duncan Brady was arrested in another part of London for cheque frauds, and the girl, confronted with him, said that it was at his instigation that she had falsely sworn away the liberty of Lewis, his friend. She had made a long circumstantial statement of all the facts.

The young woman declared that she casually made the acquaintance of the young man, Duncan Brady, last June or July, when she was in service at Ivilburn. Afterwards Brady met her almost daily, and they " walked out " together, and he promised to marry her.

Once, when she was out with him in Hyde Park, he met Lewis, to whom she was introduced. She thought this was about the end of July, and it was the only occasion in her life that she saw him before she. professed to identify him for the cheque offence charged against him.

She (the prisoner) was out with Brady on the night of September 29th, and he wanted her to go to a wine merchant's, where she was known, to cash a cheque. She refused to do so, but did not object when Brady left her and said he should use her name. Half an hour later she again met Brady at Brondesbury-villas, and he asserted that Lewis had been with him, and told her that if there was any trouble, she was to identify Lewis and say that he had been out with her. As Brady promised to marry her in^a short time she said she would, if necessary/do all this tor his sake.

In some way or another Lewis was arrested for the forged cheque, and she picked him out at Willesden, and swore against him there at the sessions. -Brady had since left her, and as he had treated her so badly she went and picked him out when he was paraded with other men on another cheque charge. Brady, during his acquaintance, had borrowed her wages and never repaid her.

■ [The case is causing a considerable discussion in the Home papers, as so tar Mr Gladstone, the Home Secretary has refused to liberate Lewis.]