NO CASE FOR JURY

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 61, 3 June 1927, Page 3

NO CASE FOR JURY

A DIVORCE SUIT LETTER WAS NOT EVIDENCE (From Our Resident Correspondent.) WELLINGTON, Wednesday. A sudden and unexpected turn ended a divorce case which threatened to have a protracted sitting to-day. Petitioner, a man living near Wellington, gave evidence of his suspicions of his wife’s infidelity, relying chiefly upon a letter to his wife which he intercepted, and also the fact that his wife absent-mindedly called him “George”—the name of the co-respon-dent. It was ruled that the evidence of the letter was not admissible. Counsel for the respondent rose to begin his case, when his Honour Mr. Justice Reed interrupted. “You need not bother,” he said. “There is really not sufficient evidence in the petitioner’s case for me to place before the jury. One cannot help but sympathise with him, because the blackguard who wrote that letter either had something to do with the woman or wrote it with a purpose. On the question of adultery there is absolutely nothing to go before a jury. If there had been any serious doubt I would have taken the jury’s verdict. Now I will simply have to withdraw the case from their hands.”