REBUKE FOR JUDGE.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20340, 25 June 1934, Page 5

REBUKE FOR JUDGE.

Reflections on Jury Verdicts. “TO BE DEPRECATED.” (Special to the “ Star.”) SYDNEY, June 14. Judge Curiewis recently characterised the verdict of a jury as “ absolutely idiotic.” This week he was taken to task by the Chief Justice (Mr Justice Jordan), who said that he thought public reflections upon the verdict of a jury were to be deprecated. The Full Court unanimously dismissed the appeal by David Jones, Ltd., in the action in which Mrs May Willis, of Gloucester Street, Sydney, had sued that company in the District Court, before Judge Curlewis, to recover £4OO damages for sustaining a fractured leg through the heel of a shoe falling off while she was walking down steps near Gloucester Street. Her case was that she had purchased the shoes at. David Jones, Ltd., and had worn them only three times when the heel fell off one of them. The jury had awarded her £SO damages, together with £8 19s 4d hospital and medical expenses, whereupon Judge Curlewis expressed the opinion that the damages were inadequate, and granted her a new trial, limited to the question of damages only. The Chief Justice said that after the jury had left the Court Judge Curlewis characterised the verdict as “ absolutely idiotic.” The remark, he said, was not made in the presence of the jury, but it was regrettable that it should have been made at all, and especially regrettable as it would appear that the jurors had to return to Court to try other cases on the following day. “It should be remembered,” added the Chief Justice. “ that jurymen are part of the machinery of the administration of justice. They are judges of the facts as the Judge is judge of. the law. and they should be treated with courtesy.”