A SUSPECTED STEPFATHER

NZ Truth, Issue 299, 18 March 1911, Page 4

A SUSPECTED STEPFATHER

UNCONVINCED CORRESPONDENT Propounds a Few Points Upon Which to Ponder. i . A Melrose correspondent , resurrects a recent case heard m the Wellington Mag- | istrate's Court by asking "Truth" a few awkward questions. A young man of respectable appearance was charged under the law relating to the age of consent, the. complainant being his own s stepdaughter, who personally laid the information to Detective Cassells. In court the girl swore that her statement to the detective was a complete fabri- | cation, and she denied that any outrage had been committed. The Government Bacteriologist's evidence, if anything, supported the girl's information to the detective, and the magistrate said that i there certainly was a very strong suspicion. However, the girl having proved herself untrustworthy, and m view of the absence of direct evidence, the accused was discharged. "Truth's" opinion is sought on the question of whether the Crown should not have had the girl TAKEN TO ANOTHER PLACE of abode until such time as the case had been thoroughly investigated ? And, furthermore, should not some of the neighbors, to whom the girl had also related her story of seduction, been called to support the indictment laid by the police? The girl, our correspondent writes, had informed some of the neighbors months, before accused was arrested, and those neighbors are willing to reveal what conversation they had with the girl concerning the case, and also with regard to certain intimidation the gtrl is alleged to have been subjected to prior to the case being heard m court. Now, so far as the first point raised is concerned, "Truth," while admitting that it may seem proper to the lay I mind to have had the girl removed fiom !thc accused's place of abode pend.ng the hearine; of the case, at the same time S point out that the police would have had to ILLEGALLY STRAIN THE LAW to have taken l»er away from her mother's protection. In Melbourne quite recently a similar set of circumstances came before the court there. The police (were so alarmed lest a girl should be "suborned," or made to vary possible lies for possible truths, or vice versa, that they arrested her on a charge of being a ■ neglected child, and had her remanded to the Neglected Children's Home for a week. On an application being made to

a Supreme Court judge, however, he directed that the magistrate's order of remand should he set aside, and the girl released. With regard to any statements the neighbors may have been able to submit, these, m all probability, would have been inadmissible as evidence from the fact of their having been made m the absence of the accused, or not immediately subsequent to the supposed offence. If any evidence exists of intimidation towards the girl, those m a position to .give it should 'sommunicate with the authorities, who may be able to mov.e m the jna'tter. But from what "Truth" has learned of the untrust.worthiness of ! the girl herself and her past career, it I seems that no judge and jury would hang a cat on her uncorroborated testimony, especially m view of her having given a detective one version and the court another of such a serious charge as that preferred ogv^nst her step-father, I