MISTAKEN MERCY.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2690, 2 November 1881, Page 3

MISTAKEN MERCY.

The Melbourne correspondent of the “ Otago Daily Times ” thus sums up an extraordinary case: — Juries often err on the side of leniency, but a more remarkable instance of mistaken mercy can seldom be produced than that connected with the acquittal of a nursegirl named Alice Wormald, on a charge of manslaughter, by a Rockhampton jury recently. The evidence showed that the girl took out two little children, daughters of a squatter in Northern Queensland, fora walk, and she was accompanied by a halfcaste girl named Flora. The nurse took the children near a dangerous waterhole, and while she was amusing herself the youngest rolled into the water and was drowned. Anxious to remove all traces of her criminal carelessness, the nurse then seized the other child and throw her into the water to prevent her telling her mother. She then walked in the direction of the home station, hut fearing that the little halfcaste would not keep the secret, she carried her into a waterhole and held her under water until she thought she was dead. The last victim, however, recovered in time to escape the fate intended for her, and exposed the absurd story by which the nurse endeavored to conceal her extraordinary crime. Wormald afterwards admitted tho correctness of Flora’s narrative ; but in spite of everything tho jury acquitted her and she was discharged. Comment is superfluous.