THE CHILD ABANDONMENT CASE

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1424, 15 June 1899, Page 34

THE CHILD ABANDONMENT CASE

AUC KLAMD. Mcndav. A young woman named Elizabeth .Hill (on bail) wars charged at the Police Court tn-day with having, on the 7th April, abandoned her female child, unr.deu two years of age. Air Brookfield ; appeared for the accused. ' Chief Detective Grace asked for a ' remand to enable two witnesses to nrri.v9.from Napier. V Mr Brookfield objected to a remand -being granted. The accused had not ■ been, allowed to see the child. Chief Detective Grace said the child tv on in the care of the C'naritable Aid Board, and if an order were obtaiued from tho Inspector of Police the child could be seen’ by the accused. Mr Hutchison said ho could not grant r o, remand. -There was no evidence to show that the accused had abandoned tlt.9 child. Detecfivo Herbert then gave evidence. i;, HcG' said that cn Sunday following the 7th cf April ho'yaw a child at Miss ■' Sparling’s home at Parnell. After that period ho was inquiring for the mother .of ’ the child, and lie caused a description. of the child and its clothing to be •published in the daily papers. On the 2nd June-, in, company with Constables Do-u.thett anti MacKee, he arrested the accused at ’ Remuera-, about 10.30 p.m. If 9 ashed her ■ wha-b sue had done villi tha baby she brought from Napier. She said she came by the Gairiooii to Onchnnga with a baby on the 7th Ami!. She arrived, about 1 p.m., and rema ned on the boat until about 8 in ihe evening, when a- man named John Tait colled with a trap and took her away with the baby. Hs told her lie hal a woman at Pa-rnell who would adept the child for £lO. He drove her to Waiter Kidd’s place at Ellers lie, where she < went into the house, 'and Tait drove away with the baby. She said she mover saw the baby afterwards, and Tait u ever told her where it was. She said - she had seen, in a newspaper where -i the bdby had been found, but she did -■not: make inquiries as to whether it was hers or not. She answered all witness’s

questions without hesitation. Sue said John Tait worked at the Newmarket Railway Workshops. He had reason to believe that Tail was now out- cf the colony. A man named John Tanhad worked at the Newmarket Railway Workshops. The birth of the child had not been registered. The accused had stopped at Kidd’s for a fortnight. Mr Hutchison, S.M., remarked that the evidence was not so strong as he thought from the depositions. Detective Herbert said the question of identification of the child was in the hands of Air Brookfield himself. The police had not brought the child with them. • Detective Grace said that was all the evidence he could offer that day. Mr Brookfield submitted that there was not any evidence that the child had been abandoned. He had the completecase ready, with witnesses who had heard wlia-t Tait said. Mr Hutchison said there was no evidence that the child brought by the girl from Napier, and subsequently found and presumably abandoned at Parnell, was the same child. The evidence of abandonment could only be produced from Auckland, and as it ws-a not produced the case would be dis* missed.