ON TRIAL FOR HIS LIFE

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 186, 27 October 1927, Page 11

ON TRIAL FOR HIS LIFE

DALMATIAN CHARGED WITH MURDER DISAPPEARANCE OF MAORI GIRL’S BABY

fHARGED with the murder of the infant child of Rosie t J* e< u^ U aur i Flat, near Kaitaia, on August 23, Paul Lendich a, Dalmatian gumdigger, aged about 9, appeared for trial before Mr. Justice Herdman at the Supreme Court to-day G- P- Finlay and Mr. J. B. Reynolds appeared for the accused.

JT was unnecessary to remind the jury, said Mr. S. L. Paterson, in opening for the Crown, that if the verdict was one of guilty a certain sentence must necessarily be imposed. It would not be the jury's sentence, It would be the sentence of the law. “The murder was of a newly-born infant,” he continued, “and in the eyes of the law that is just as much murder as the taking of an adult life. In order to establish the guilt of the accused the Crown will have to prove that the child was born, that it was alive, and that its life was extinguished by the prisoner. If you are satisfied that the child was born and that it lost its life, through no intention of the prisoner, but through neglect, you can find him guilty of manslaughter. I suggest that the evidence will point to the act being one of murder, and not manslaughter.” The case presented certain peculiar points, said Mr. Paterson, and one was that the body of the infant had never been found. The popular belief that no person could be convicted if the body were not produced was entirely wrong. That was not necessary. CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE The evidence was partly direct and partly circumstantial, he continued. The principal evidence was that of the mother, a Maori girl, aged 19 years, who lived in the same district as the accused. “She kept company with him,” the prosecutor went on, “and about two months before the date of the offence, he took her away from her mother and she went to live with him in a whare at Kauri Flat. This whare was near a gum flat which was full of potholes containing water. “On August 23 the girl became ill and the child was born. At the time of the birth the accused and the girl were the only two in the room. She will say that the child cried after birth and that was important because it showed that the child must have been alive

“Later that day she left the room and upon her return the child had disappeared. The accused told her he had thrown it away. He warned her to say nothing about the birth to anyone and threatened to kill her if she did.” "She told several people that there had been no child, but it served to show that the accused exercised absolute dominance over her. “Where did the child go?” asked Mr. Paterson, “it could not have walked away/’ MAORI GIRL’S STORY The mother of the infant, Rosie Tewhiu, in evidence, through an interpreter, said she had known the accused about two years. She related the events leading up to the birth of the baby, but proved a reluctant witness, the interpreter experiencing difficulty in obtaining answers. “When the baby was horn it cried,” said witness. “It was a girl. The prisoner told me it was. When I had been outside I came back to find that the baby had gone. I asked the prisoner where she was and he said ‘I have taken it to a place known only to myself.’ I cried then, and the accused told me not to tell anyone. If I told he would kill me.” The following day her mother and sister visited her. She denied that a baby had been born, hut her mother got a doctor. The girl insisted that the doctor had not told the truth. She then went back to live with her mother, but the accused came and persuaded her to go back and live with him. When her mother protested, the accused got hold of her and threw her on the ground. Witness would not reply when Mr. Finlay asked what language she spoke with the accused. She was a friend of Mrs. Divich, who lived quite close. Counsel examined the witness on details connected with the birth. She admitted that the accused went for Mrs. Divich, who examined witness, just prior to the birth. She was a visitor to the whare during that day. (Proceeding, f