A PRISONER'S' BOOTS.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 19, 17 October 1907, Page 10

A PRISONER'S' BOOTS.

'■./. JUDOS FINDS FAULT WITH THE •' i POLICE. A deteetivo who arrested a man charged .charged with burglary, was reproved by Mr. Juscico Gordon on Octobcr 3 at tho Adelaide Criminal Court, for having taken.off ac- ' V ciiscd's boots iii orxldr to- complete the evidenco against Bait ' • — It transpired that tho •. soil beneath the window u'!',. ; ch had- bepi: forccd. opon .was; a' '.-■ irasturc.;<vf;.i:iy nantl, and, therefore dismayed br;? l :'prints .'which had been made .in it most clcarly.. The officer in-question brou.Ljjio lrbm Port Adelaide Police; Station t-> t'pe. ho'us'3 whic'a had boen'''broken' into. Tho; la iter had br.c.n. provided with another p.iir of boots, and the pair accused had boon woariiig wore 'used 'in': comparing . .the dimensions of the prints'with; those of .accused's boots. 1 Trio measurements:: were ■ f."«ad to correspond in every, particular;•.-. Jtiis Hononr said that police officers had.no right, , to' remove ,any. of accused's-|clo'thing,'" ; 'and ) : therefore, tho. deiccti'/o was..not';justified in taking off cesusetj's boots, even, though ho gave him ; 'anothcr pair. Such an action amounted to assault. If it wero allowed /there would bo no end to such conduct, and they might as wc-il strip the person naked. (Laughter).' . , v . . - Had the boots been su'spccted of having been stolen, it would .have been entirely different, added !iu Honour. It would not matter if accused expressed his willingness to be so treated'. Howercr,' no hariji had been done in thin caso, and, no doubt, the policc thought they v.*crc doing their duty. Ro- ' ferrhig to tho fact that-tho detective had conducted accused from his residence to tho ; police station, and'tbenco to tho .house .whichhad been entered, His Honour "sai.d. that''oyen if tho man was under arrest tho policc could ■ not legally take him all over South Australia to find out if.his bootprint-s correspondedwitli those of the man who had committed' tho burglary; such treatment, in tho caso'of ah , innocent person, would amount to monstrous injustice. Ho had never before hoard of this method of pros',:ring a conviction. Taking possession of a presumably innocent man and conducting him to tho scene of tho robbery for such a purpose was asking him to convict himself. -;■ To'say ; the .least.'of it, it was a gross oxcess of .duty,on' tho: part; of tho police, and an insult to the person in charge. Tho number'of deaths, caused by tho.'wreck; jf the Bordeaux express frAiri "at• Coiitriis re-" jently is officially reported to be ton. jers give a pathetic account :of tho. finding of some of 'tfce "bodies. A- girl could be' beard crying continually, "Mother, my mother!"' It was not until eight .hours after the catastrophe that she was found under tho wreck of a third-class carriage. Kho was clutching tho cold body of her mother, and bar father lay dead by .her > side. Sho was asked what her ..naino was,' lint, could not answer, and a few. inomonts afterwards she > died. The child—a pretty little girL with fair hair and large blue eyes—had received uo physical injury, but the. terrible hours she bad spent under the wrcck of tho" train had tilled her. Tho bodies have boon identified us those of ?d. and Mine. Petit and their nix-.f.'ar-old daughter.