HUMAN BRUTE'S CRIME.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 81885, 12 November 1906, Page 2

HUMAN BRUTE'S CRIME.

ILLTIIEATS JUS IUIONTtI-OLD CHILD. HASTENS ITS DEATH. MAXIMUM PENALTY IMPOSED. SIX MONTH'S IMPRISONMENT.

(Per Press Association). Auckland, October 10. William F. Clausen, a labourer, was _ put upon his trial at the Otahuhu | l'olico Court, charged with having caused the death o£ his child, llonald ' frank Clausen, under the age of three months, by using physical violence. Constable Foreman said the child appeared to have disturbed its father at uight, and on those occasions the

father took the child up and. shook it, and on one occasion slapped it across ike back, causing a black Druise. One night ku ordered his wife out of bed because the baby was crying, and its she wjuld not go lie carried the child out of the room and laid it down in the kitchen, and forced his wife out by assaulting her, and blackening her eye. Jiven after the child was dead, lie refused to attend the funeral besause he lind to go to work. Dr. Kowley said that on Saturday, October 27th, he saw the body of the infant after death, and found it in a \ r ery dirty, uncared-for condition. The uody was .that of a poorly nourished, ;unkealtky child. At the bottom of the track was a bruise, where the skin had oeen broken. He made a post-mortem examination of the body and found no internal eyidence of injury. He believed the cause of death was convulsions, due to enormously dilated stomach in a weak, unhealthy child. His Worship: Do you think the violence indicated by external bruises bad. any effect in causing death ?

AVitness: It would cause a certain amount of shock, ami reduce the child's vitality and power of resisting disease, and so hasten death. His Worship : Bo you think it was a direct cause ot death t Witness: IN'o, not directly. His Worship : if instead of illusage, the child had received kind treatment, would its life have been saved ? Witness: 1 think if it had received proper treatment, its life would have oecn prolonged, aud it possibly would liave recovered. This concluded the doctor's evidence. His Worship expressed the opinion that the doctor's evidence was lnsuilijient to sustain the charge of manslaughter, and it would therefore lie uis duty to d.Swiss die charge, it vas, however, open ior the police to amend the ehurgt; iu one of assault.

The information was amended accordingly, and accused was charged with having committed' common assault upon the child about October 21st, by slaping it on the back and shaking it Accused pleaded guilty, and in reply to his Worship, admitted that the constable's opening statement was true. His Worship, in passtug scutence, said to the prisoner; " You are a lucky man to escape the major charge, i think that a man like you is a great brute. A man who wilt shake and slap a little infant three months' old is unworthy of the name of man. iour conduct was simply brutal, and I cannot condemn il too severely. I shall giye you for the aggravated assault the full penary that the law allows me to give you. I convict you on your own confession, and i sentence you to six months imprisonment with hard labour."