The Dean Case.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5322, 29 July 1895, Page 4

The Dean Case.

PROCEEDINGS IN THE COURT OP APPEAL. [Peb Prkss Association.! WELLINGTON, July 27. Argument on the motion for leave to appeal in the case Regina v. Minnie Dean waß openod in the Appeal Court to-day. All five judges were present. Dr Findlay appeared in support of the motion, and Mr M'Donald, Crown Pro* secutor, InvercargiU, and Mr Gully, Crown Prosecutor, Wellington, for the Crown. In his argument in support of the motion Dr Findlay submitted that the oase of Makin v. the Attorney-General of New South Wales, on the authority of which evidence objected to had been admitted, did not apply. That case had merely repeated what was previously established, that evidence of the conduct of the accused on other occasions similar to that charged iv a porticular case could be given to dispose of a suggestion that the particular act charged waß accidental, or to rebut any other similar defence open to the accused. In the present case the evidence had been admitted professedly to eliminate the element of accident, but at the time of its admission there was no evidence of accident. It had riot been suggested that if Mrs Dean administered morphia tp the child she has done it accidentally. The evidence of Mrs Dean's ; dealings with other children was therefore not properly admissible to disprove acci- ; dent, and unless genuinely offered for that f purpose could not be admitted merely to : strengthen the general evidence against •: the accused. To make evidence of other : acts admissible they mnst appear to be part '. of a series of similar occurrences and to be - parts of one scheme. In the present esse the essentials of previous occurrences were .' not sufficiently similar. There was want- : ing the essential circumstance of finding the bodies of other children alleged to have been received by Mrs Dean, and in ; the case of findir*g the skeleton of a child ; in the garden there wss nothing to identify it in any way as that of any child taken in jby Mrs Dean. Dr Findlay concluded his ; argument shortly before one o'clock, when i the Court intimated they did not desire to j hear counsel for the Crown then, and if ; they required to hear them they would do j so on Monday morning.