ALLEGED INDECENT ASSAULT.

Patea Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 967, 4 December 1882, Page 2

ALLEGED INDECENT ASSAULT.

The hearing; of the charge against Robert Carter Gowland was continued at the R.M. Court through the whole of Friday and on Saturday till 1.30, at which hour the further hearing was adjourned till Monday. Mnkaki’s evidence continued : After I said 1 kndw the accused, J told the Natives to lot them go. Miriama did not make any complaint when .1 got hack to the Rah. I saw the younger boy holding the horses. When .1 got closer I saw the other one holding the woman down by the bead and hair. Ry the Court : I did not see anything else than (ho accused holding the woman down. Jl ori Maka deposed to seeing I ho accused as holding the woman as described by Inst witness. When accused rode away, Miriama got up and said she was defiled by (hose men. Wo answered “ Vos, we bail seen it.” Witness then described bow bo followed them to the gate, where they were slopped by some of tho Maoris, who wore working at their cultivations. Cross-examined : 1 did not see Miriama’s clothes in disorder, I did not apeak to accused, and did not see tho woman until 1 came pretty close to her. Wercta deposed to catching accused at tho gate. Mukaki, who was with them, said 1, could lot them go. Wo had nothing to drink when we came to Whcnuakura. Tho hotel was closed on that day. Miriama was quite sober that day. I was walking and talking with her. Cross-examined : It is about two hours

walk from the beach to Whenuakura. Miriarna might have been an hour going from Whenuakura to where she met the young men, but it could have been done in half an hour. It was autho gate leading into the Maori road that the interference took place. I think it would be about 4 o’clock at the time. The natives took no liquor down to Waipipi. Alexander Crozier, constable at Patea, deposed to having visited the scene of the alleged assault which was pointed out to him by defendant. The road is 7 feet wide, and has a verj 7 steep siding. There would not be room for a horse to pass if the woman -were lying down. I could not find complainant but met her son Mukaki on the 30th. He took me to a place near the junction "of the two roods where he said the alleged assault took place. He then took me to the spot leading on the Sheahan road where he heard Miriarna cry out, a distance of 197 paces from where Miriarna was when he heard her cry out. There is a discrepancy of nearly 300 yards between what the native witness told me and what the defendant states. Cross-examined.—There were no marks on the grass at the locality described by the natives. In coming from the point described by Mukaki the natives must have passed the woman on the road. It would be about eleven paces from where the woman was to the fence. The native described how he saw Miriarna, He said she was lying down and the big boy was standing over her. That was all. The little boy was holding the two horses, with his face towards the fence. The native made no complaint about her clothes being interfered with. He said that the boys rode off and he followed them ; and at a gate a few yards from where the alleged assault took place he took the whip from accused. There were no marks to indicate a scuffle at any place up the hill. In investigating this easel went to the hotel and made enquiries as to the natives being drunk on the Saturday and Sunday. The hotel - keeper, Mr Hunter,said they had laid in a large supply on Saturday, but had had none on the Sunday.