JURY FRIENDLY TO PRISONER
After six witnesses for the Crown had been heard at the trial of an Italian in a Melbourne Court lately on a charge of perjury, the Crown Prosecutor informed Judge Moule that two of the jurors had told him, during the luncheon adjournment, that the prisoner was an old workmate of theirs on the water-
Judge Moule: They should have spoken about it before. Naturally, they might feel a certain amount of sympathy for the prisoner. Before discharging the jury, and remanding the prisoner for another trial, Judge Moule, amid laughter, recounted this story about biassed jurors: “I remember that the late Judge Box once presided at the trial of a man on a charge of cattle stealing in the country. When the jury had been empanelled, the clerk of the court whispered to the Judge that the foreman was an uncle of the prisoner, that two cousins were fellow-jurors, and that many of the others, if they had not already stolen cattle, might indulge in cattle stealing.”
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Stratford Evening Post, Volume II, Issue 342, 28 August 1933, Page 8
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172JURY FRIENDLY TO PRISONER Stratford Evening Post, Volume II, Issue 342, 28 August 1933, Page 8
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