THE ALL SMOKE CASE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17350, 15 May 1924, Page 11

THE ALL SMOKE CASE.

YESTERDAY’S HEARING.

3ROWN PROSECUTOR’S ADDRESS Mr Donnelly «aid the accused said—md they were entitled to say that it was for the Crown to prove the case. I r was for the jury to say, in face of I lie clear and cogent evidence, whether it was open to the - accused to say that there was any doubt. The accused ha 1 tho benefit of the services of Air Hanlon, who was by common consent of the public and his learned brethren the orator of the New Zealand Bar, and the case for the. defence would b*> put forward with all the ability, force and eloquence which characterised Mr Hanlon. The speaker ventured to say, however, that in tho main and essential features the case for the Crown was beyond any attack at all. THE MAIN ISSUE. The jury would have to centre their attention on the main issue: Whether the horse that ran on those two days was All Smoke or v. as it some other ? They mpst not allow their attention to be dragged down a side track. They would have noticed that in the crossexamination the Crown witnesses had been examined on some unimportant detail. The witness Wilson, a stipendiary steward, had been held up to ridicule by counsel, but the. question as to whether the authorities in Auckland were slack had nothing to do with the question : Did tlies two men ring in a horse in Auckland? Indeed, it did not lie very much in the mouth of these two accused to say that they carried out this swindle so brazenly and openly that the officials were fools to let it get past them ; that had. nothing to do with it. A WRONG DESCRIPTION Discussing the description in the race-book and the criticism made in this connection. Mr Donnelly said it was not the book that was wrong: the horse was wrong. The book said it was a bay horse, and it was a bay which had been dyed. The feelings of Williamson and Capes on arriving at the course to find that their horse had been described as a bay could be imagined. It showed a good deal for their courage and heart that they went on. in spite of the chance of some of the officials noticing the difference in description. . This only went to shots tho lengths these men were ready U go in the scheme they had long prepared to defraud &be public, the competitors and the Racing Club. WHAT THE CROWN PROVED. The Crown had proved that th« real All Smoke was outside the court, the bogus All Smoke was dead and the hide lay on the floor of the court. When counsel for the defence addressed the jury he invited them to watch for an explanation of this. After dealing with the circumstances of the destruction of the horse and the finding of copper in the hide Air Don nelly said that the case for the Crowr was really divided into three parts (1) The history of All Smoke ; (2) the actions and conduct of Williamson anc Capes from the time they were seer on the train on November 13 up til November 26. when the horse was dis posed of at the boiling-down works (3) the acts and conduct of the mer after tteir return from Auckland. The Bennett would be attacked Bennett's cadence did not assist th< Crown a great deal, except to tell o one or two things that it was obviou; must have happened. In conclusioi i the Crown Prosecutor said it was at offence about which there was nc | glamour, romance or extenuating fea | ture, and if the evdence satsfied th< jury that the men had been concernet I in the fraud their duty was plain, i they had any reasonable doubt thei they would be entitled to acquit. * OPENING OF DEFENCE. Mr Hanlon said he did not intend t< carry them away by any flights o rhetoric as had been suggested by Mi Donnelly. He was not addicted to tha but merely intended to place befori them the facts. The Crown Prosecu tor had addressed them at length, oi the opening day. and also at. the con elusion of the case. He could not un derstand why a case, if it was a strong as his learned friend would have it, needed such advocacy. He was not complaining of the manner in which the case had been presented, ' but what he did complain of was the strong appeal which the Crown Prosecutor had made to the jury to convict. There ■were four counts in the indictment and the first two alleged conspiracy. It was not necessary to try and separate these counts. If they brought in a verdict of guilty they would have to convict at least two of the accused. What the jury had to do was to devote their consideration to the fact as to whether or not it was proved that these men were involved in a conspir- . VALUE OF EVIDENCE. There was no direct evidence in this case, it was purely circumstantial, and where circumstantial evidence was produced in order to try and get a conviction the jury must be satisfied that the evidence not only was consistent with the guilt of the accused, but also was not inconsistent with any other theory. It may have struck the jury that some of the circumstances were suspicious ; that was not enough. They had to place all the pieces together and form one fabric from which they could draw the conclusion that there was no reasonable doubt that the men were guilty ; otherwise they were entitled to the verdict. Tho defence had been twitted about the cross-examination having been devoted to merely side issues. Part of the cross-examination was devoted to the officials. Nobody seemed to have noticed that a black horse which ran. was described in the book as a bay. The Grown said the point was that some horse uukown was substituted for tho horse All Smoke. W here was the evidence of that? If it was a fact that some horse was substituted. where were the two stipendiary stewards? These were men who knew All Smoke.

THE ERROR IN THE BOOK. Did the Crown mean to say that if this horse had been introduced that these two stipendiary stewards, whose business it was, never knew ? One glance at the hook, one glance at the horse and these men were howled out; if the stewards had been attending to their duty these men could not have escaped. Th** witness Wilson said it struck him that there was a brown colour showing on -the. muzale and round the eyes. A good many of the witnesses had said something to the same effect, and it had seemed as if their evidence had been coloured in the. light of after events. Although the horse was supposed to have no reputation. it was backed down to a £4 dividend, and the Crown had suggested that somebody must hare known about this horse. Counsel contended that it was the public—people like Detective Knight—who had backed the horse. WITNESSES CRITJCISEI >. Dealing with the class of evidence on which the Crown asked for a convict ion, Mr Hanlon referred to the evidence of Jones, who had not had

anv connection with All Smoke since 1021. All he did was to say that it had been a bad-tempered horse, and that it was All Smoke. Bennett was another who was brought in tor the purpose of driving home the case against the accused. In the lower Court he had told a bundle of lies? Was he not a selfconvicted perjurer? Were they prepared to take the evidence of one man who in one court told some lies and then came and admitted it. stating that what he said that day was correct? He had not stuck to the truth when he made his second statement. M’Donald made one statement to the police and another in the court. Where had the Crown raked up all these lying witnesses? It was easy enough to say that they had told a lie at the instigation of one of the. accused, when the men were in the dock. The jury could not rely on such evidence. WHERE THE HORSE WENT. The Crown had tried to show that the horse the men raced was killed. There was one man who identified Williamson, and his evidence was unsupported. Was that sufficient to prove that the skin was obtained from a horse which was handed over at the boiling-down works by Williamson? There was too much doubt in the methods which had been adopted to prove the case. None of the witneses had stood the test when it_ came to the crucial point. "When Kelsey’s stable boy took delivery of Bluewood was another horse left in the van. and lie invited the jury to believe that this v.-as the horse that Williamson took to the races. Subsequently the horse was spelled in a paddock and returned to Christchurch. All Smoke- the horse which was found by Detective Gibson, had also been north and had been shipped hack. In face of this, was there anything left in the Grown case ? Mr Thomas =aid from the evidence it was clear that Tucker was the owner of All Smoke, entered it for two races and left the management to Gapes and Williamson The horse had been sent north and had been returned from Kelsey’s paddock to Christchurch when M'Donald took charge of it. The case for the Grown was that a ringing-in occurred while the horse was north. If this did occur, what the jury ha 1 to find was whether Tucker was a party to it,. Evidence had been given that Tucker had demanded the stake won by the horse, and the question might be asked why he had not taken proceedings to recover the stake from I the club. The reason was that under ’ the Xew Zealand laws a man could i not take proceedings for a stake won 1 by a sporting event.