MURDER CHARGE AGAINST BOYS.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 17082, 14 August 1917, Page 3

MURDER CHARGE AGAINST BOYS.

REDUCED TO MANSLAUGHTER. (Peh United Pbess Association.) AUCKLAND, August 13. In his charge to the Grand Jury, tho Chiff Justice referred to the charge of murder against two boys named Ernest Claude Gibbons and Richard Reibana in connection with the death of a little girl named liene Ellen Quinn, aged six years, who was drowned on June 19, at Kirikiri, near Thames, it being alleged that one or both of the boys forced her into the 6tream. His Honor said the law provided that where an offender was under seven years of ago ho was incapable of committing a crime. In the caso before the jury one of tho children was seven years and four days old when the girl was found in the river, so that had her death occurred five days earlier he could not have been charged with tho crime. The law also provided that in cases where an offender was between seven and fourteen years old the onus was on the Crown to show that tho offender knew that his aot was wrong. This aspect of the ease woidd apply to the Maori boy, who was not yet nine. Personally, he was not aware I that there was anything to lead the jury to the conclusion that the Maori boy-was conscious of wronfr. The Grand Jury reduced the charge to manslaughter.