Lawyers and Witnesses.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XVI, Issue 2714, 28 January 1892, Page 2

Lawyers and Witnesses.

(by a police court habitue.)

There is such a tendency, on the part of a section of the Waipawa townsfolk, to give a local application to anything appearing in the Waipawa Mail, that it is perhaps desirable to introduce the following remarks by pointing out that they are not aimed at any local lawyer ; not that he would be likely to seek satisfaction even if he thought otherwise. However willing to shed the last drop of his brother’s blood, a lawyer is very conservative as regards his own. These

suggestions are elicited simply frj desire to mitigate the peculiar u torture which many witnesses expe at the hands of skilful and unscruj lawyers, and in the hope that sot your contemporaries may give the enlarged circulation. A superfici, server, with no experience of ou courts, may say, “Oh ! Why shoi, honest and straightforward any hints. He has only to narratt he knows in a plain, unvarnished f ; but the chances are that nine out o who talk thusly would tell a very dij story after their first expeiience i witness box. The mass of honest witi are not logical, and are quite ignor* the law of evidence. Consequently are apt to substitute their own opi inferences, and conclusions, for the ra of fact which they are only entit state in evidence. An ordinary w in our law courts, when under L treatment by a leading lawyer, mi compared to a naked gladiator against a lion with but a knife whet to defend bimself. When ODce he to set forth his inferences as fact

know that the knife of the vivisect Will soon make mincemeat of bis evid Of course, this might be all very w only his inferences, frequently illo wore thus discredited ; but a doubt il often cast upon the facts which are j woven with them. Before the with cross-examination, facts and infer< fall together. It may be said that the business of the opposing lawve separate the wheat from the tares for livery to the judge or jury, and that,i a case is well threshed out by both g everything which is not genuine grai sifted out ; but a prolonged observt has convinced me that the process' unsatisfactory one. In the putlx terests, it is desirable that only the m relevant to a case should be elicited by the simplest and most expedi; means. This will be facilitated by thing wbicti tends to make an h witness master of the situation. In o to make any beneficial alteration, th operation of the legal profession w<u some extent be requisite. Already t is a tendency in this direction. Tht type, the human sledge hammer, «j ideal cross-examination was a contii pounding or pegging away, is bi largely replaced by men of the suavik modo school, who make insinuation subtle as at first almost to escape no; and whm 'heir victim has once yiel his assent to these, gradually draw hio from one admission to another. I and there are still professional bu who cannot unlearn their arts, but rarely occupy eminent places in the 1 ranks. Perhaps the most provoking of lawyer to bo met with is the man treats his witness as Professor Archi manipulated his phonograph in Waipg As the Professor stopped bis phonogr in the middle of a word, so some law proceed to extract evideuce, taking exactly as much as is wanted, and not grain more if they can help it. T adopt the meter system, and manipo witnesses as if they were so much gas water, supplied with many taps, to turned on or off at pleasure. Whent can get hold of a friendly witness of Sampson Brass type, then are they e remely happy. “ Here I am, gentlea brimful of evidence, only wanl tapping.” And here I may m a suggestion to the honest witnes others I leave to their fate. W a lawyer tries to cut you short in way, and starts another question, proceed to complete your reply to the fi and let him understand, firmly but polit that yon will not answer any questi until you have been allowed to finishy replies to previous interrogatories. 1 Judge—l leave Justices of the Peace of consideration, as their conduct is ol so erratic—will back up a witness in : course as his right, seeing that he is sw to cell the whole truth. It is not to expected that a witness should not b his own opinion respecting matters dispute. It is only when he exhibit* i opinion in an uncalled-for manner, substitutes inferences for facts in evidence, that the opposing lawyer i accuse him of bias. What the witn can and should do, is to present tbe f« iu the light in which they appear to mind, and then generally his inferenc if justifiable, will be deduced from tbw (To be continued.)