TRIAL FOR MURDER.

Taranaki Daily News, 25 June 1921, Page 5

TRIAL FOR MURDER.

CHARGE AGAINST A MAORI. THE JURY DISAGREES. A NEW TRIAL ORDERED. By Telegraph.—Press Association. Hamilton, Last Night. At the Supreme Court to-day the trial of Hakaraia Te Kahu, charged with the murder of Patrick Richard Elliott, at Ongaroto, on March 26, was continued. Mr. Gillie#, Crown solicitor, addressing the jury, eaid it was clear from the evidence that Te Kahu was courting Sarah Herepeka, and was hard up. He knew Elliott had received his pay on Saturday. On Sunday the two men went shooting and Elliott wafl never seen again. It had been proved that Elliott died of a gunshot wound. The shot was formerly in the possession of Elliott or Te Kahu. The doctor’s evidence was absolutely conclusive that Elliott could not have inflicted the wounds on himself. Mr. Gillies said the gun was discharged eight or nine feet away, which excluded the possibility of accidental, discharge by Elliott. Te Kahu had shown that he was within a few yards of the spot where the blood stains were found. It was shown that a light was seen in Elliott’a whare on Sunday night; also that Te Kahu visited the whare between Sunday and Monday morning, as he was seen wearing Elliott’s overcoat at Mokai. If Te Kahu left Elliott in bed, how was it that Te Hoko, when he called at the whare before breakfast, did not find Elliott there.

It was beyond doubt that the £lO note was paid to Elliott, and it was also clear that Te Kahu was in possession of a £lO note at the “two-up ring” on Monday. Elliott owned a brown leather wallet, and it had been proved that Te Kahu had a wallet on Monday, although prisoner made a statement to the contrary. Therefore it had been proved that while on Saturday Te Kahn wa# short of money, on Monday he had plenty, including a £lO note and two £5 notes. Two £5 notes, which wore actually paid to Elliott, were found to have been passed into the Mokai Po#t Office. Counsel passed on to prisoner’s statement to Campbell Hamilton that but for the bloodstains the police would not have known an occurrence had taken -place. It had been proved that the two cartridge# found 150 yards from the scene of the tragedy were fired out of Te Kahu’s gun. The bacteriological test proved that the bloodstains were human blood. Elliott’# gun was never found; had Elliott returned to his whare the gun would have .been there, or if he met with an accident the gun would have been found. CASE FOR THE DEFENCE. Mr. Hampson (for the prisoner) said no evidence had been brought showing that Elliott had a brown leather wallet, while only two men said they had seen Te Kahu with a wallet. Counsel for the Crown had not proved that there were no pig stains on the trousers, nor had he proved that Te Kahu passed the two £5 notes paid to Elliott into the “two-up ring”. Mr. Hampson discounted the evidence regarding an attempt at concealment by prisoner to hide his trousers in the chimney; a constable had stated that the trousers were placed in quite a natural place on a shelf to dry, and no attempt had been made at concealment. Mr. Hampson, continuing, claimed that the evidence was only circumstantial and very weak. The Crown had not put forward irrefutable evidence that the murder could not have been committed by anyone but Te Kahu. There was no dispute and Elliott and Te Kahu were good mates. There was no evidence to show that on Sunday Elliott was in possession of a considerable sum of money. It was quite clear the wound was not deliberately self-inflicted, but possibly it was accidental. There was not a scrap of evidence to show that the two specific notes were ever in Elliott's possession and the Crown failed absolutely to connect Te Kahu with the two £5 notes paid into the Mokai post office. With regard to the cartridges, it was shown that the boxes found in Te Kahn’s whare had contained No. 5 shot, while the box in Elliott’s whare contained No. 3 shot, yet the jury was ask. ed to assume from this that Te Kahu borrowed two No. 3 cartridges for the purpose of killing Elliott. Counsel criticised the action of Detective Sweeney in taking charge of an empty box in Elliott’s whare, while doing nothing with empty boxes on the floor of Te Kahn’s whare until later on, when he returned and got the boxes as evidence against prisoner. Then he deliberately cut oil’ the tops of the boxes, the inference being that the Crown wanted to show that the boxes were recently purchased. If No. 5 cartridges Were the only ones Te Kahn had in his possession he could not have killed Elliott. The Crown had deliberately destroyed evidence in regard to the bacterological tests; the Crown should have taken every step to cheek the tests. The jury had been deprived even of evidence as to whether pig’s blood was on the trousers as stated by prisoner, or in what proportion was pig’s blood, if present, and what was the proportion of human blood they contained. THE DISAGREEMENT. Te Kahu had not made a single contradictory statement. It might have been possible that Elliott left home early on Monday for another shoot and had fallen in with somebody who killed him accidentally, and then losing his head threw the body into the river. In fact there were, innumerable possibilities as to how the unfortunate man met his death.

After four hours’ retirement the jury disagreed. A new trial was ordered.