EXTRAORDINARY SLANDER CASE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIX, Issue 9013, 19 October 1892, Page 6

EXTRAORDINARY SLANDER CASE.

BELIEF IN WITCHCRAFT AMONG THE NATIVES. [by TELEGRAPH.— own correspondent.] » Taoranga, Tuesday. An extraordinary case was brought in the Resident Magistrate's Court here, to-day, before Mr. R. S. Bush, Resident Magistrate, Tawha, a Maori chief, Bued Maraio, a native woman, for £20, for slander, in saying that he (Tawha) had bewitched a girl named Harete, and cause her death. On Mr. Moss, who appeared for the plaintiff, opening the case, the magistrate informed him that he could nob hear the case himself, but that two assessors would have to sic on the Bench, and that there were only two assessors in the district. Mr. Mass said that his client would not nominate/either of the local assessors, and asked for one to be sent from Waikato, the expense of which he hoped the Government would bear, as it was hard enough on natives to have to pay interpreters without having to find and pay assessors. Mr. Bush said it seemed to him that a deal of expense might be incurred in a case like the present, and that the Court had no jurisdiction to hear it, witchcraft not being acknowledged by European Courts; it was not legal slander to accuse a man of practising the art. Mr. Moss then stated the case, which was as follows :—Harete fell ill and was taken to the defendant, who has of late started in business as a mind-reader and faith-healer. Defendant after examining the patient, who evidently was in a consumption, declared that she had been bewitched, and described how th 9 plaintiff had some months before collected the cuttings from a dress she was making, and after sundry incantations over these cuttings had buried them under a tree near his house, and as they decayed so the girl failed in health, and gradually died. This case might seem a ridiculous one from an European point of view, but according to native ideas it was a most dangerous charge to make against anyone, and, in the old days, had been a prolific source of fierco inter-tribal wars. The last man in the district known to have been accused of witchcraft, or makutu, as the natives call it, was taken in a boat on a fishing excursion, and was alleged to have fallen overboard, but curiously enough when his body was recovered his skull was fractured. Mr. Bush admitted the seriousness of the charge, but said he could find no precedent for such an action in the Resident Magistrate's Court. To this Mr. Moss replied that this was probably due to the persons accused of makutu-ing having died before they could bring the action. Ultimately the hearing was adjourned for fourteen days to enable assessors nominated by the parties to be sent for. The court was crowded with natives, who look upon the case as a most important one from their point of view, as the charge of makutu is a most serious and dangerous one in native estimation. Inspector Emerson and Sergeant Kiely watched the case on behalf of the police.