THURSDAY, JUNE 5, 1890.

Timaru Herald, Volume L, Issue 4861, 5 June 1890, Page 2

THURSDAY, JUNE 5, 1890.

The closing scene at the Coroner's Inquest on the New Plymouth murder would have been very laughable if one had been able to forget for a while the abominable crime which was tho cause of the investigation. The dreary mass of evidenoe, much of it totally irrelevant and calculated sorely to perplex the most intelligent of listeners, having been at length completed, the jury were called npon to consider their verdict. They did so, and after about an hour's absence, returned with the finding that " the deceased, filaloney, had been wilfully murdered, and that suspicion rested on the Maori, Main Kahi " — the man whom the police have charged with the offence. The coroner refused to accept the fiuding, and told the jury that they must bring m either a verdict of wilful murder ugainst the prisoner or an open verdict (that is, that the murder was committed " by some person or persons to the jurors unknown "). They again retired, but after a considerable lapse of time said that they could not alter their verdict. Once more they were sent back and kept till 10 o'clock at night, when the Coroner attain interviewed them, bnt with the same result. Then the coroner ordered them to bo locked up for the night. Twelve honrs afterwards they were found still of the earno mind, and the Coroner told them that be must record the verdict as an open one, The foreman protested against that course being adopted, and yet again the jury were sent back. At 2 o'clock m the afternoon they presented the same solid or stolid front of resistance, and tho Coroner, eeemingly sick of the businosß, bound them over to attend the next sitting of tho Supremo Court to bo held at New Plymouth. It is clear that he did bo on the assumption that they had not returned a verdict which could bo regarded na legal. He would have been right m his action if that had really been the case. It ia m strict accordance with the law relating to Coroners' Inquests, and we remember an instance m point which occurred some years ago m New Zealand. In such cases tho Judge directs the jury on the law, and thereafter they generally manage to arrive at a verdict. But the ludicrous part of the New Plymouth business is that tho Coroner made a grout ftißS absolutely about nothing. He seems to have got it into his hend Unit the verdict must strictly follow some ouo of the convenient forms which are to ho found m the lato Mr Juatiae Johnston's little book about Coroners and Coroners' Inquests. But there ib rciilly no suoh necessity. Tbe verdict which tho jury brought m was a very good one, and was not m the smallest degree vitiated by the concluding words about suspioion resting on the prisoner. Those words were mere surplusage, and ns tho jury chose to atick to their own form of expression, thny should without a shadow of doubt have been allowed to have their own way. The main points wore (1) tlmt they pronounced Maloney to have boon murdered (they would have been idiots to huvo said that ho died a natural death), and (2) that they did not veuturo to fix tho crime on the Maori or any one else m particular. Why then should tho Coroner havo stickled about the form m which that finding ishould bo embodied ? Probably the juvy would have mude not tho smiillcst objection to the first part — that is tlic l&kcuUhl part — of their iiudiug being

pat into technical language as long aa the substance was retained ; but even if they had insisted on no change whatever being made m their verdict, it ought to have been received and set down m " the inquisition " aa the formal record is culled. What the Judge will say to the jury when they come into his august presence is more than we can predict, though for once it would be easy to penetrate into his thoughts. He cannot hang these sturdy New Plymouth citizens for not having adopted the views of the Coroner, and if they stand " shoulder to shoulder" m the Supreme Court as they did m the investigation which has just come to an abortive conclusion, they will m the end have to be discharged. Ab we remarked m a former article, they might just as well have been discharged weeks ago ; m fact, aa soon as they were prepared to say that Maloney had been murdered. They probably came to that conclusion after the first day's sitting, and they are not much further advanced now. The farce that has just been enacted at New Plymouth, and especially the ridiculous nonsense of the closing scene, should have the effect of attracting attention all over the colony to the necessity for a change m the law relating to preliminary investigations m cases where there is reason to believe that there has been foul play. Why not sweep away the whole stupid relic of the past, and adopt some procedure more m accordance with the needs and with the intelligence of the present day. " The wisdom of our ancestors " is very often shown to be rank foolishness m the light of the latter end of the nineteenth century. It is so with Coroners' Inquests, which have become a mere device for harassing a lot of respectable men into jury service from which not the smallest particle of good arises, and for affording officials an opportunity of earning a guinea or two out of the public purse.