THE EDALJI CASE.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 2091, 28 May 1907, Page 3

THE EDALJI CASE.

SUMMARY OF THE FACTS

Mr. Georgo Edalji was arrested four years ago on a charge of being the author of a series of shocking mutilations of cattle at Great Wyrley in Staffordshire. The prisoner was the son of a Hindu clergyman well known in the district, and was practising as a solicitor in Birmingham at the time of his arrest. The evidence was wholly of the circumstantial kind, and has since been strongly criticised by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and others. Horse-hairs on an old coat of tlio prisoner’s (which admittedly was packe.d by the polico in the same parcel as a portion of a horse’s hide), and a “bloodstain,” which "Mr. Edalji’s defcndeis are tolerably certain was a foodstain, together with certain allegations as to his past conduct as a practical joker (although there is good reason, according to the arguments of Six* Conan Doyle for believing that those ficalcs were maliciously laid at his door by others), formed the chief points supporting the charge. Edalji served throe years of his sentence, and lvas released last October. During his incarceration his father repeatedly wrote to the Home Secretary, and even published a pamphlet purporting to slioxv the flimsy evidence on which the young man had.been convicted. .Then at the beginning of this year Sir A. Conan Doyle’s strong interest in the caso brought the facts into strong relief. The celebrated novelist, in 16 columns of the Daily Telegraph represented: (1) That the prisoner could not have committed the crime oxving to his defective vision, and the dai’knes3 of the roads between his home and the scene of the crime; (2) that there was some person in existence who was intei*ested in ruining Edalji, who may or may not have been related to an old servant of the family who had displayed great vindictiveness towards him when a boy, and that the mysterious person in question had been known to have inculpated him on previous occasions; and (3) that the positive evidence was weak and controvertible. Sir Arthur Conan Doylo found many supporters, including a large number of notables, such as tlie xvhole of tho professors of Birmingham University and many leaders in . letters and science,