MANSLAUGHTER.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 20094, 25 November 1930, Page 17

MANSLAUGHTER.

SAL AM AN FOUND GUILTY.

TWELVE MONTHS' IMPRISONMENT. IWXSS# ASSOCIATIOK TEUSGSAIO NLW PLYMOUTH, November 24. ound guilty of manslaughter on one a our counts, an Indian herbalist, raham Wally Mahomed Salaman, was to-day sentenced to twelve months' nard labour by the Chief Justice, Sir 7 lc^ae - Myers. The jury took two ours forty minutes to reach its decision.

The charge on which Salaman v.as ound guilty was that on August 2nd, at New Plymouth, he hastened the eatli of Lyall Gordon Christie, aged a . ' thereby committed man- . ur by omitting without lawful excuse to perform a legal duty assumed y him in respect of Christie in that, hi a f g to and prescribing for him, ailed to use reasonable care. Counsel Address Court. Crown Prosecutor, Mr C. H. Veston, addressed the jury. He said tat the qualifications of accused were not the issue. Anyone could practise ana could charge for service, but could not sue for fees. The questions for the jury were: (1) Did accused, as Christie s medical adviser, have to conduct tho case of the boy? (2) Did his eonduct of the case cause or accelerate the death of the boy? (3) Did such conduct show a lack of skill, knowledge, or lack of care, or both? Counsel reviewed tho evidence and dwelt on the fact that when insulin had been stopped, and the boy had been brought to him evidently in a state of coma, Salaman took no action when the case was evidently beyond him.

Mr counsel for accused, in his address to the jury, submitted that the weakness of the Crown's case lay in the fact that it placed alternate charges. The evidence had not shown that Salaman was responsible for the boy's death. The child had been given till liis sixth year to live. He lived eight months beyond that. Concerning the medical evidence, Mr O'Leary said that insulin had not been in use for more than seven years, and no system had been treated longer than that. It was possible that the child's condition was a result of insulin losing its power. Then, again, .doctors in Wanganui gavo no hope for the life of the boy, but doctors at New Plymouth did not hold the same view. It was submitted that the child was starting on his last fatal onslaught, which could not bo averted. The mother, not wanting the child to die without hav : -g done everything that she could, took him to Salamau. It was contended that her evidence alone showed that the death of the boy was not hastened by the happenings at New Plymouth. Accused had said that if there was insulin he would not treat the case. The accused had never advised stopping insulin. Plain Ca&e of Charlatanism. In reply to Mr O'Leary's plea for leniency, His Honour said: "I cannot lose sight of the fact that this is a plain case of charlatanism. In giving judgment in a similar case in the Court of Appeal in England, the Judge said that such quacks as prisoner should not bo allowed to go unpunished. With that opinion I cordially agree." A recommendation to mercy was endorsed on the indictment by the jury, but was not mentioned aloud in Court.