APPEAL COURT.

Taranaki Daily News, 28 March 1916, Page 7

APPEAL COURT.

ABANDONMENT OP A CHILD. TECHNICAL POINT Ra^SLD. By Telegraph.—(Press Association. Wellington, March 27. The Court of Appeal heard argument to-day in the Crown case reserved, King v. Elizabeth Russell. The prisoner was indicted at Napier for unlawfully abandoning a child under the age of two years. It was common ground that the child was left in perfect safety in the Napier Hospital, where it would be in every way well cared for. The judge refused to withdraw the case from the jury and directed the jury I that, if they found that the prisoner loft the child in the custody of the authorities of the hospital intending to cast the burden of maintenance permanently uijpji the Charitable Aid Board, they shoulOnd the prisoner guilty. The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and the question for determination by the court is whether, in the circumstances, the direction of the judge was correct and if prisoner was properly convicted. Mr. Dolan, of Napier, appeared for the prisoner and the Solicitor-Genera 1 for the Crown. Mr. Dolan submitted that there having been no damage to life, no offenci was committed. The Solicitor-Genera contended that offence was committed if the child was abandoned, whether the child's life was endangered or not. The court reserved its decision. FIRE INSURANCE CASE. The Appeal Court reserved its judgment in the case the King v. Olive Theresa Haynes and Thomas William Haynes, of Napier. The woman was indicted for making a false declaration of loss under a fire insurance policy, and the male prisoner with abetting the commission of the offence. They were found guilty, and the court was now asked to decide whether the verdict was correct, it being alleged that the declaration did not refer to the Justices of the Peace Act nor to the list, of chattels alleged to have been destroyed.