BRUTAL TREATMENT OF A GIRL.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4146, 4 July 1874, Page 5

BRUTAL TREATMENT OF A GIRL.

A case in which a girl 11 years of age was cruelly treated by her father was brought before the police court, at Eingal, Tasmania, on Monday, June 15. The following particulars of the case are from the Cornwall Chronicle : On the information of John Smith, Superintendent of the Eingal police, E. Herbot appeared to answer to the charge of ill-using one Emma Herbot, his daughter, a girl of 11 years of age. Defendant pleaded not guilty. Sub-Inspector Quinn, attached to the Eingal police, and stationed at Mathinna, deposed,— I know the defendant, E. Herbot, now present, who resides at Mathinna. Erom information I received, I rvent to the defendant’s hut between 4 and 5 o’clock on the evening of the sth of June. I saw a girl there, Emma Herbot, in a room off the hut. The room was very dark. I called for a light to see the girl. Mrs. Herbot pulled some things from the window to admit the light. I then saw the girl now present in a comer of the room. She was in a state of nudity. She had a rope made of some calico round her body. It was wound twice round her body, and another piece of rope was tied to it and fastened to a large nail driven into the wall of the hut. I asked the defendant’s wife to unfasten the girl, and she did so. I examined the girl and found three marks, one black one, and two reddish ones, on her back, and several elsewhere. I asked Mrs. Herbot how she could ill-use the child and confine her in that state ? She replied, “Oh ! it is not me this time, her father has punished her.” I saw the defendant, and had a conversation with him, and informed him it was very cruel to tie the child up as he had done. He rereplied “it had come to something when ho coidd not correct his own child ; he had beaten her for stopping out all night from home.” I told him I would report his conduct. The universal report at Mathinna is that the girl has been constantly ill-used. To the Bench — The marks I have spoken of appeared to have been inflicted by a rod. There was no fire in the room where the child was tied up. In the marks I saw on the girl the skin was not broken. The marks were on the legs and back. The girl appeared to have been crying very much. The punishment, in my opinion, had been inflicted on the bare body. Mrs. Herbot is not the mother of the girl, and is not the wife of the defendant. The child, when I saw her, was very cold. The magistrates retired, and after a short deliberation returned into Court, and fined the defendant £lO, in default three months in gaol, but allowed him fourteen days to pay in. Mr. Dawson said a more disgraceful case he never heard. He was the father of a large family himself, and the conduct of the defendant had positively disgusted him. Defendant was the father of the child, and common humanity should have taught him, as the author of her being, to display affection to her. Eor himself he should have liked to have inflicted the full penalty, viz., £2O, or six months in gaol. The Warden said for the future, if another case of a similar nature came before him, he would impose the full penalty the law allowed.