SUPREME COURT.

Evening Star, Volume IX, Issue 2772, 5 January 1872, Page 2

SUPREME COURT.

CRIMINAL SESSIONSThis Day. (Before Mr Justice Chapman.) The sittings of the Court were resumed at o’plock this morning. ‘SENTENCE. Duncan Davis wag brought up to receive sentence upon the charge .obtaining goods by false pretences at Tapapuq tawyence, and Tokoraairiro. Prisoner pleaded guilty to the last two indictments. His Honor, in passing sentence, said prisoner must have known that when signing the cheques in the manner he did there was no money standing to his account at the bank, as the bank clerk had informed him of that fact ■ ust before. The case had been fully proven agaips.t him ; and for the first indictment he would, b.e imprisoned for twelve months, with hard labor $ f.vV tha second, six months, with hard labor ; arid f.Qr ,the third, till the rising of the Court—being eighteen months in all. CHARGE OF HORSE-STEALING, James Isteed was charged with stealing a horse %t Lawrence, the property of John Mackenzie. Mr Haggitt appealed fQ r tlje prosecution ; Mr Catomore for the defence. John Mackenzie, in evidence, said fie was a laborer, residing at r,l uapeka Plat, and Jie had lent the horse in question to a map named Hugh Ross, about seven months before it was taken away. After the horse was missing, lie searched for it about Tuapeka, when a friend informed him that prisoner was seen riding upon a horse like his, and upon prisoner being arrested, lie first stated he got the animal from a man named John but afterwards, as there was no such' person j.n the neighbourhood, he stated that as tfio horse ifia.4 been about the place for three months he had qsed it to ride upon. He never lent the horse to prisoner or authorised him to take it away. In

cross-examination, .witness prevaricated as to: gr statement he had made before the magistrate at Lawrence, as contained in his deposition. He then stated that he knew the prisoner, but in his examination said he had no knowledge of him. Upon being asked which was the true statement, he said he had a slight knowledge of prisoner. The horse was worth LlO. Hugh Ross, in evidence, stated he borrowed the horse from John M‘Kenzie. He would not swear that he did not say he had a down upon the old man—meaning prisoner—because he had been insolent to a friend of his, or that he made a bet he would get three months. W. Olaribond, gardener at Ross’s Gully, saw prisoner riding M'Kenzie’s horse, and told M'Kenzie of it. He knew prison r, but not feeling quite sure it was the horse, did not mention it to prisoner. Augusta Isteed, a child, daughter of the accused, said she recollected the day her father left with the horse to go to Mr Rae, at Spylaw, for whom he worked. He had a sore leg caused through rheumatism, and her mother said he ought not to walk while there was an old horse knocking about the paddock. Her father replied that ‘ ‘ mamma was very foolish, as that would look like theft,” and her father started on his journey without it. They both watched father up the hill, and seeing he could not get along, mother told witness to put a bridle on the horse and take it to her father, which she did, and her father got on it. Thomas Isteed. son of accused, recollected his mother telling him to go to Spylaw to fetch tbe horse his father had taken, but,he did not go because he thought he would lose his situation. He remembered the horse being about his father’s paddock for a long time, and it partially destroyed a stack of oats belonging to his father. The horse frequently broke down his father’s fence, and he had on several occasions turned him out of his paddock. He considered the horse was not an easy one to catch. John Blair, farmer, had known the accused for five years, and resided near him the whole of that time. He had frequently seen the horse straying about prisoner’s premises and the stack of oats belonging to Isteed was nearly all eaten by the horse. He considered the stack worth more than the horse. Ross had said to him (witness) he would make a bet prisoner would get three months for it. He had been asked by Mrs Istead several times if he knew to whom house belonged. There was a pound within three miles of his own and Isteed’s farm. : , . Mr Catomore, in addressing the jury fpr the defence, contended that there was ho felonious intent. The prisoner was afflicted with rheumatism, and at the solicitations of his wife the horse was taken to help him on his journey of seventeen miles to Mr Rae’s where he was working. His Honor, in summing up the evidence, |aid it was a case entirely for the jury to consider. The case was not so strong against the prisoner as of horse-stealing generally, where a person' aerify sells or disposes of a horse in such a masher ap to deprive the proprietor of ownership. At the solicitation of his wife the man had been induced to ride the horse, though against his own convictions, and it was the old crime of the woman tempting the ! man, tljough very natural under the circumstances of her husband’s lameness. But it was not because be rode the horse on that occasion that the jury would convict, for any lad in the country who found a stay horse and had a ride upon it would be liable to a similar conviction. The evidence, which rather went against the prisoner, was, why, there being a pound within three miles, he did not send the horse, to that pound, or why the wife was so anxious that her son should go and fetch the horse back from Spylaw if it was such "a nuisance to them, and had been eating such a quantity ,of their oats. At the same time a man was not bound to take a horse to the pound, and tlj.e jury, in cases where evidence was given % members of one family, should not give too much beep to any little contradiction which might be made, a§ )q the case of the boy, who said the was h a fd P° gateh, while the little girl, who was much younger, made a statement that she caught it and took it to her father, when he had got some distance up the hill. The jury returned a verdict of “not guilty”; and the prisoner was acquitted. The Court adjourned to Monday.