SUPREME COURT.—CIVIL SITTINGS.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 5126, 28 August 1877, Page 2

SUPREME COURT.—CIVIL SITTINGS.

Monday, 27th August. (Before his Honor the Chief Justice.) THE WAKA MAORI LIBEL CASE. This case was called on at 10 o’clock sharp, the parties to the suit being Henry Robert Russell, James Grindell, editor, and George Didsbury, the printer and publisher of the Waka Maori newspaper. The action was to recover the sum of £IO,OOO for alleged libeL Mr. Macassy, with whom were Messrs. Stout, Bell, and Fitzgerald, appeared for the plaintiff; and Mr. Conolly, with whom were Dr. Bnller and Mr. Chapman, for the dants.The following special jury was empannelled; —Messrs. J. Hransfleld, S. Carroll, H. Lyon, G. S. Sellar, D. Mclntyre, N. Merchant, J. Watt, T. W. Young, E. Toomath, J. Lockie, T. Turnbull, and H. Gaby. The case for the plaintiff was opened by Mr. Bell, ’who read the articles containing the alleged libellous matter, the following being a specimen ■“ I, Mangai Uhuuhu Kingi, and others (names attached), have discovered that the whole procedure of the pakeha, Henry Russell, is reprehensible; that his wrong-doings are evil in the extreme With respect to his acts of cajolery and deception practised towards us in times long past, together with those spoken of above, and his promise that he would a«t the part of a father towards the Maoris, and that he would take care of our lands as a possession for our children after us, lest they should be absorbed by the many pakehas of Napier,—l have to say that in no whatever did the pakehas of Napier act towards us as he has done ; they never came endeavoring to wheedle away our lands under the assumed cloak of friendship, and then afterwards trying to get their lands from them. A sura of £5 for four years’ rent! Verily the Maoris have come to grief through the acts of Henry Russell. Attempting to retrace their steps, they find the water has reached to their necks; they are powerless to return to the shore, and are lost in the depths of the ocean. He is a perfect taniwha, this Henry Russell (a fabulous reptile supposed to frequent deep waters), in his capacity for devouring men. He has ■ a throat like the parata, which we erroneously supposed existed in distant seas, but we find it here in our midst (meaning a fabulous monster said to exist in the depths of the ocean, supposed to cause the ebb and flow of. the tides by drawing in and ejecting the water from its stomach alternately). He is a more obnoxious weed .than the Scotchman (i.e., the Scotch thistle),” &c. Mr. Conolly, for the defendants, admitted the publication of the letters, after which, Mr. Macassy, in an eloquent speech of considerable length, stated the plaintiff's case. He commenced by saying that it was one which. W&-S calculated to test the patience of the Court and jury, .but- he felt nevertheless

that it would receive at the hands of the jury that earnest consideration which its great importance demanded. They were, of course, aware that the case had for months excited' considerable interest from one end of the colony to the other; and for several months past no subject had claimed so much attention; and they were also aware, no doubt, that the trial was appointed to take place in Wellington, in order that it might be free from those difficulties which must inevitably occur in a district where a good deal of feeling existed as to the cause of dispute and the minds of a jury were therefore calculated to be less free from bias. They could not forget, however, that the atmosphere of Wellington, especially at the present time, was to a certain extent almost saturated, as it were, with politics, and that this might, he thought, make some difference in the trial of such a ease ; but speaking for himself and his colleagues, he might say that he had every confidence in the jury disassociating its mind altogether from any influence of the sort, and giving a verdict according to their conscience. The plaintiff, he went on to observe, came before them as a public man, against whom the gravest charges had been made, and asked them to decide whether * or not his character ' was to be assailed with impunity. He had been accused of appropriating trust funds, and practising the grossest duplicity and deception upon a number of uninformed natives, with regard to lands on which he invited them to enter; and these charges were contained in the letters which had been read by his colleague, which, whilst they imputed the gravest charges on the one hand, were, on the other hand, of the most trivial and contemptible character. They had before them as defendants the presumed editor and publisher of the newspaper, and although they might consider it would have been much better to have had the real parties before them against whom Mr. Russell had cause for complaint, such was practically impossible, and for all the purposes of the present action, the defendants who had been brought before the Court were legally responsible. Besides, by having the editor, Mr. Grindell, before them, they could obtain from him some evidence as to the publication of the letters, from which some conclusion might be arrived at as to the amount of injury sustained by the plaintiff through the publication of the alleged libels. The plaintiff was; one of the oldest settlers in the Hawke’s Bay District, having by the exercise of industry and intelligence acquired possession of a large extent of landed property, and in the course of hisprogress toward that end he had found it necessary to cultivate relations of the most friendly character with the natives. He had therefore for a considerable length of time been looked up to by them for advice, the result being that at a time when many of the Europeans in the Hawke’s Bay District carried their lives in their hand, so to speak, he (the plaintiff) was elected to represent the Government -there. He might mention also that in the year 1873, when a commission was appointed, over which Mr. Justice Richmond presided, to inquire into certain native land purchases, and when ever 300 charges were laid by the natives against Europeans, comprising persons in every station of life, 'Mr. Russell succeeded in escaping scatheless. Not: withstanding that however, and the fact that there had been no ground for complaint against Mr. Russell in his native land dealings, the libellous letters referred to had been published in a paper whose circulation throughout the colony was extensive, while it was known that copies had even reached the mother country. Apparently no inquiry had been made of Mr. Russell as to the truth or otherwise of the alleged libel, although there could be no doubt that it was the duty of the editor to have made the strictest inquiry into the matter; and it was an ascertained fact that he had had ample time in which to make such inquiry during the interval between the receipt of the letters-referred to and their publication- He pointed out that the note over one of the letters, stating that the editor did not identify himself with its contents, did not relieve the newspaper of any of its legal responsibility. Moreover, there was a footnote to the letter, which; he contended, showed that the editor must have been aware that before any deed of land could be made effective it would require to undergo inspection by the officers of the Crown, who would be bound to see that the various conditions had been complied with. It also must have been patent to the editor that, if there were any ground for impeaching the transaction, the natives had their remedy in getting the deeds set aside. But in the face of these, facts, well known to the editor, the letters had appeared, conveying the imputationthat Mr. Russell had, by treachery and duplicity, wheedled one of the natives out of his land, and had been endeavoring to swindle others. One of the letters purported to be signed, by twelve natives; but he should be in a position to- show, that certain of the natives mentioned were averse to the contents of at least certain portions of the letters, and one of them had applied to the editor of the Waha Maori to have his name struck out from amongst the signatures. Even if the accusations contained in certain clauses of the letter were true, he pointed out that it related to an occurrence which had taken place eleven years ago, and this showed that the defendant was actuated by animus, he having endeavored, so to speak, to raise the ashes of the dead, with the view of ostracising Mr. Russell in the eyes of his fellow colonists. In conclusion, the learned counsel contended that in the present case there was no fear the action taken by the plaintiff would in any way interfere with the liberty of the Press. The newspaper in question occupied a different position from that of an independent journal. It emanated in fact from the Native Department, Mr. Russell having been struck at from behind a masked battery, and plaintiff had no other resource than to take action against the present defendants. He hoped therefore that the jury would not allow their minds to be biassed by any [baseless consideration of that character, but that they would extend to his client that principle of justice to which he was; entitled, and that he might retire from that Court eventually without the slightest stain on his character. The effect would also be salutary as acting as a warning to others who were disposed to print and publish libellous statements of their fellow-men. At the conclusion of Mr. Macassy's address, Mr. William Grace was sworn in as interpreter. The first witness called was Pona Tahuri, who deposed that he lived at Poukawa, near Te Aute, and was a cultivator of land. He had called on Mr. Grindell, editor of the Waka Maori, for the purpose of having his name struck off the list of signatures attached to the letter produced. He did not know Mr. Russell personally. He knew he was a white man externally, but he was not aware of the color of his inside—as to whether it was white or black, for instance. Defendant told him that Mr. Russell was a deceiver, as also was his lawyer, Mr. Sheehan, who deceived the' natives in order to accumulate sixpences, which they spent in drink. H. T. Clarke deposed that he was undersecretary 1 1 the Native Department. He knew the letters produced. . He advised Grindell not to publish Arihi’s letter, and asked him for a translation of it, which was furnished. The letter and translation were subsequently handed to witness, who put them aside for a month; but afterwards gave them to Grindell for publication, in pursuance of instructions from Sir D. .McLean. His reason for advising Grindell not to publish the letter was that it contained statements regarding -a gentleman in another province which it would be improper to publish. The Native Department took no steps to ascertain the truth or otherwise of the statements contained in the letters. Ewen McColl, Parliamentary Librarian, gave evidence as to the circulation of the Waka Maori among the. members of both Houses of Parliament during session. Colonel Whitmore and Mr. Taiarea were called to give evidence as to the impression calculated to be ma.de upon the minds of persons reading- statements of the kind complained of by the plaintiff. Tarawera deposed that he had hot sanctioned the signing of his name by anyone at the foot of either of those letters. This concluded the evidence for the plaintiff. Mr, Conolly then opened the case for the

defence, ara at the conclusion of his address Dr. Duller proceeded to read portions of the evidence taken before the commission at Napier. . Mr. Macassy raised an objection that certain parts of the evidence were not admissable, the questions being of a character at times Which could not be received in a Court constituted like that in which the present case was being heard, and • , His Honor, before ruling, said he would look into the questions referred to. At 5 o’clock the Court adjourned till 10 o’clock next day.