TALKIE AS WITNESS

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 872, 16 January 1930, Page 14

TALKIE AS WITNESS

ADOPTION IN AMERICAN COURT HOUSE-BREAKER HEARS i CONFESSION The talking film has assumed a j new importance in the United States with its admission as evidence in a court of law. Harold Roller, an alleged housebreaker, on trial in Philadelphia, before Judge Gay Gordon, jun., who has admitted a talking film of the prisoner taken in gaol by the police as testimony for the prosecution. The judge said: — “I see no grounds on which to exclude this picture. “Still” photographs, when properly identified, are always admitted as evidence. The courts have always recognised the use of a scientific invention.” After this decision the picture was shown on a screen, while Roller sat in court with his head down. He was shown sitting in an office of Inspector Connelly’s bureau, and as the picture proceeded Roller was represented in the act of confessing to the robbery of 24 homes. Counsel for the defence, Mr. John Whitaker Lord, jun., objected to the judge’s ruling, his chief points being that a talking film could not be subjected to cross-examination, and might be capable of recording errors. Mr. Schofield, the Director of Public Safety in Philadelphia, who initiated the talking film as a Robot detective, proposes to make it a regular, although unsalaried, worker in his police department.