CHILD NEGLECT.

Taranaki Daily News, 23 September 1920, Page 5

CHILD NEGLECT.

"INHUMAN TO LAST DEGREE." - 1 GAOL FOR MARRIED COUPLE. , By Telegraph.—Press Association Christchurch, Last NightAt the Magistrate's Court, before Mr. S. E. McCarthy, S.M., Herbert Charles Ross and Catherine Annie Henrietta Ross, a young married couple, were charged under Section 28 of the Infants' Protection Act with having, during the past six months:, wilfully neglected and exposed an illegitimate male child, aged two years seven months in a manner likely to cause the *child unnecessary suffering and injury to health. ' The evidence showed that the female accused was the mother of the child, and the putative father had been regularly paying maintenance. On September J4 a constable and a nurse in the,employ of the Public Health Department visited the home of the accused, and found the child "in a neglected and poorly clad condition, sitting on a hard chair in a yard. Its feet were swollen with large sores. The constable informed the mother that the child seemed to be slowly dying, and she admitted that she was unable to give it the care it should have, There were three other children in the family, two the legitimate offspring cf the accused, and another illegitimate child. A medical man said the condition of the child named in the charge was due to starvation and neglect. The accused denied Ihat the child had been starved, and stated it had received the same nourishment as the other children. His Worship remarked tnat the treatment extended to the child was diabolical and inhuman to the last degree. Each accused was sentenced to three months' imprisonment.