STRANGE CHARGE OF ATTEMPTED MURDER.
(From the Melbourne Argus.)
'A respectable-looking man named George Eiokle, steward on board the' ship Loch Ness, Was i charged, on remand, at tho Williamstowu Court yesterday, with tho attempted murder of John Stewart, an ordinary seaman' bf the ship, on Monday morning. The lad Stewart fell down the hold of the ship upon some stone 1 ballast on the previous morning, and received a dreadful fracture of the skull, from which his recovery is doubtful. Constable Bolger, after the supposed accident, instituted inquiries which aroused the suspicions of the police as to i there having been foul" play, and the result l was ■ that Eickle, the first steward, was arrested the same evening on suspicion
of having attempted to take the life of Stewart by throwing him down the hold. When the case was called on at the Williamstown Court yesterday, Sergeant - , Daly applied for a further remand till Friday. ! This Mr. Harcourt, attorney for the prisoner, strenuously opposed., The police had not up to the present adduced a tittle of evidence which wpuld lead anyone to suspect that there had been foul play, and there was not a single word or fact to connect the prisoner with any offence whatever. It was then agreed that a magistrate should proceed to the residence of Mr Figg, surgeon, where young Stewart was lying, and if possible: take his depositions. The lad, however, was not sufficiently conscious to give coherent replies to the questions .put to him. The Bench, however, thought it unfair to keep the prisoner in custody under such a serious accusation, without having some evidence before them to warrant it. Accordingly, Mr Figg, who had attended the' lad, gave evidence. He explained the serious nature of the injuries—a fracture of the skull llin. in " length, and exposing the brain, and a broken arm, and he gave it as his opinion that it would he almost an impossibility for Stewart, after receiving those injuries, to have climbed up a perpendicular ladder from the hold to the , main deck, jln cross-examination the witness , said;: —‘.‘All the injuries I have" described may have been occasioned from falling down the hold, and took place at 'the same time.. I am not prepared to swear that the lad : could not have climbed’ up the ladder. ' During a lucid interval since the accident, I asked the lad Stewart how he was injured. He said he fell into the main hatch; that he got out of the hold by the ladder, and went to the steward and showed him' his injuries. He also said that no one pushed him.” Constable Bolger said he accompanied the party who carried young Stewart 'from the ship to Mr. Figg a: residence after the accident. The prisoner was there. While they were waiting for tire doctor, tlie prisoner took one of the. sailors named Mackenzie out into the passage and hurriedly whispered something to him. When the prisoner returned, the constable went out and spoke to Mackenzie, who, in reply to a question, said he did not know how it occurred, that the boy' was on deck when he first saw him. The prisoner’then rejoined them, and in reply to a question by the constable as to who first saw the boy after the accident, prisonersaid he did—that the lad came to the cabin door and called out to him. Afterwards the doctor said it was impossible for the hoy to have got up on deck without ’ assistance. This fact, taken with conversations he had had with some of the men on board the ship, led to his arresting the prisoner on suspicion. In reply to Mr. Harcourt, the constable sard his inquiries did not show that anyone on board,had any ill-feeling against the boy ; on the contrary, ho was a general favorite. In answer to the Benoit, Sergeant Daly acknowledged that at present he had no stronger evidence against the prisoner than he had brought' forward. Mr. Pearson, chairman of the Bench, after consulting with Messrs. Fryer and Aitkens, sard they did not feel that there was sufficient before them to warrant them keeping the prisoner any longer in custody on this charge, and he was accordingly discharged. So far as the evidence revealed, he left the court without a stain upon his character. The court was crowded when the decision was given at p‘ p.m., and the announcement of the Bench was received with applause.
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New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5319, 13 April 1878, Page 2 (Supplement)
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743STRANGE CHARGE OF ATTEMPTED MURDER. New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5319, 13 April 1878, Page 2 (Supplement)
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