BAYLY’S DEFENCE

Evening Star, Issue 21750, 19 June 1934, Page 8

BAYLY’S DEFENCE

PACKED COURT HEARS COUNSEL EXPERT EVIDENGE CHALLENGED [Per United Press Association.] AUCKLAND, June 19. * Mr Northcroft continued his address to the jury for the defence this morning, when the hearing of the Bayly murder trial was resumed. Notwithstanding heavy rain and a northerly gale, large crowds of men and women packed the court, the women in particular evincing great interest in the proceedings. Mrs W. A. Bayly was again present, as was accused’s father, Mr Frank Bayly. Continuing to deal with tho cartridge cases, counsel said they had been identified by experts in such circumstances as made identification almost incredible. The shell found in Lakey’s garden was old and tarnished, and appeared to the police to have no bearing on the case; yet now it was identified positively. Mr Northcroft then read a legal authority, which stated that there was no kind of testimony less free from bias than that of experts. While he did not attack the witnesses’ honesty, he did most strongly attack the cogency of their arguments. “ Experts, with the utmost honesty and tho iitmost desire to be fair, find the things they are looking for,” declared counsel. “ The most honest witnesses come to court and make statements they honestly believe to bo true, but which are influenced by stronger minds than their own.”

In respect of the shell found at Bayly’s, there was no satisfactory observation made of it at the time, while no statement had been taken from Bayly. There was not a scrap of evidence that it actually fell from his pocket at all. It fell from clothes being lifted from the cot. It was possible that it had been picked up by the children, who might be collecting such things. Bayly had said “ that would be from my rifle,” a speculative remark which would be expected from a man who had been shooting recently. It was possible that there had been confusion in handling the shells and replacing them in their containers. Nothing had been advanced to clear up the possibility of confusion while the shells were inspected at Auckland; The Crown had said it was possible that Bayly, when at Lakey’s on the Tuesday with the searchers, might have dropped tho shell found there. If Bayly did have such a shell from the rifle, and while at Lakey’s picked up the cartridge shell, he might consider it of no importance, and then have thrown away by mistake the shell he had in his dwn pocket, retaining the shell fired from Lakey’s rifle that he had picked up. THE SHELL PHOTOGRAPHS.

“ There are some significant elements in the photographs of .the shells to which I would like to draw attention,” continued counsel. The Crown had invited the jury to conclude that the two shells had been fired from the same rifle. Yet it was utterly impossible to make a proper comparison of the two shells hy putting them in the microscope one after the other. This could only be done with a forensic microscope, with which both shells could bo seen simultaneously at the same focus, in the same condition, and with the same lighting. One double photograph, on being printed by the defence, showed an extraordinary difference in the length of the striker mark. It was unfortunate that when the Crown’s witnesses mounted these photographs, fully a quarter of an inch had been cut off one mark. Dr Brown had accounted for the failure of coincidence in one shell hy declaring that the striker which fired shell 70 had been clogged with dirt. Professor Worley had not agreed with this explanation. Dr Brown had found five points of resemblance between two shells ; yet Professor Worley declared that he had found twenty-five. “ But neither drew your attention to the points of dissimilarity,” continued counsel. “ I invite you to go oyer the shells, and I suggest that you will find that the experts’ identification has been based on chance similarities of lights and shadows on photographs taken under different conditions. Not the slightest significance can be attached to these cartridge shells at all.’ Mr Northcroft said that when the police arrived, Lakey’s dog was tied. Whoever tied the dog must have' been familiar; and that person could not have been Bayly. If the dog had been at the. house when an altercation occurred, it would have made a noise which would have attracted Lakey’s attention. Had the dog been at the cowshed and come up with Lakey, again it would have made it impossible for Lakey to walk into a trap. THE GUNS. Counsel said that when Brader was at Lakey’s on the Sunday afternoon Lakey’s best double-barrelled shotgun was not in the house. It was later found in the swamp with the pea rifle. Whoever returned with it to the house that afternoon, it could not have been Bayly, whoso relations with Lakey were not such as to suggest that he would have been lent a gun. He had Calvert’s gun at his house at that time. Again Bayly could nob have got Lakey’s ammunition without ransacking liis house. Whoever took the ammunition was acquainted with the run of the house. No acceptable view could be taken, no matter how the _ Crown’s theory of an ambush was examined, continued counsel, who asked why Mrs Lakey was put in the water. Why should not the person, whoever he was. have used the pea rifle to kill her? REMOVAL OF BODY, “ If Bayly could not have removed Lakey’s body in the manner suggested by the Crown then the whole case collapses,” proceeded Mr Northcroft, who had the wheels and frame brought before the jury. “ Half the spokes of the wheels have gone. Can you believe that a vehicle in that state could have been used to convey an list man down the hill from Lakey’s house? The ground over which tho vehicle is supposed to have been taken was sodden, tho vehicle, laden with a heavy man, would have made very definite cuts in the turf, while tho cow droppings would have been cut completely in half. The wheels would also have - left characteristic marks in several places which must have been crossed.” * DEFENCE’S THEORY. Counsel suggested that some tragedy occurred near the wheels, which resulted in them becoming blood stained. The person responsible then ran the wheels downhill, meaning to conceal