POTS AND KETTLES

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 133, 2 December 1929, Page 9

POTS AND KETTLES

A RECORD SUIT

REMARKABLE SYDNEY CASE

(From "The Post's" Representative.) SYDNEY, 24th November. For more than a month the Judge in Divorce in Sydney (Mr. Justice Owen) has been listening to the evidence in one of the most remarkable eases in the history of the State. The costs in the action already run to £7000, and as the suit cannot end for at least another week, it is probable that the bill will leach £10,000. This amount will be a record for any divorce suit in the Southern Hemisphere. Several years ago the famous Vincent divorce suit occupied the attention of the Judge for 39 days, but it is probable that the present suit will go to 40 days at least. There are pyramids of evidence, and the thirty-six witnesses that have been called and recalled have spoken more than 2,000,000 words. ; Two million words that have revealed the sordid lives of both parties! Two million words that have told • countless conflicting stories! Such haa j: been the nature of the evidence that it i led the. Judge to make a most remarkable utterance. Ho told counsel that ' when they addressed him they must not expect to upset the case for the other side by pointing to discredit attaching to various witnesses and principals. In other words, he said it was no use "the pot calling the kettle black." The general atmosphere of the ease, he said, had produced a type of witness that was necessarily unsatisfactory, and that was not an aspect that was confined to one set of witnesses or one party. It is interesting to give a study of the parties and the witnesses founded on a few of their admissions. For instance, there is the principal of the suit. He has been co-respondent in a former suit, and has admitted* that he drew a cheque ip assist a man likely to give evidence to "know nothing." Another principal was divorced in a former suit. He had been fined for drunkenness, and admits giving false 'evidence in a former suit. A third principal is living apart from his wife, who haa an order against him. He jadmits going for a week-end jaunt with 'a young woman. The fourth princi.pal had divorced his wife and was living with a woman. Ho had two convictions for false pretences, and had been convicted for stealing. '. A woman witness pleaded guilty to sly grog-selling, and she said that she had used anotlier name but her own. A girl admitted that she spent a weekend with one of the rsepondents, while a youth also a witness said that he had been convicted for illegally using a 'motor-car, and had been, fined for assault. Another woman witness said ; that for sixteen years she was associ-1 ated with one of the wealthiest men ; ;in the Commonwealth, who up to the; time of their break was treated by "him lavishly. A male witness said that he had been convicted of larceny (from a blind man; another that he had •been discharged from the Police Force .for insubordination. Then there was a New Zealand jockey who admitted that he had been unable to secure a ■licence to ride in Sydney. . And so on. • The reputation of other witnesses was no better. It is from this maze that the Judge must endeavour, to sift the tiutb,