IS WILLIAM HAZLITT INNOCENT?

Thames Star, Volume XIII, Issue 4232, 25 July 1882, Page 2

IS WILLIAM HAZLITT INNOCENT?

{To the Editor of the EvßKiKfl Stab.) Sir,—One witness swore that the mother of Lavinia Hamilton told him that she had laid the; information ■to be revenged on Hazlitt. Two witnesses swore that the child was untruthful. In addition to this the child's story is incredible. The child swore that she did not scream ; nor did she tell her mother that Hazlitt had violated her, giving as a reason that Hazlitt had threatened to stick her with a big knife if she told her mother or anybody else. And the same thing occurred on each occasion. It was not necessary for her to go past Hazlitt's house in Eolleston street to reach the hospital as her mother swore. The child could have gonebv^^^^taAteJHMMg BailliestE^^riflflfl^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^l

voluntarily went back the very next day and tru<ted herself in the house with the man who had threatened her with a large knife, and caused her intense pain. But, after having been served in the same brutal fashion the second day, she goes back the third day to have the offence repeated. Is this probable—can any sane person believe her? The judge, in his sympathy for the poor child, had no sympathy to share for the poor prisoner accused of a horrible crime. He summed up dead against the prisoner in his address to the jury. He thought it impossible that a child of her age could concoct such a story. His Honor thought it improbable that the mother had concocted the story for revenge, in spite of evidence to that effect. In spite of the" 7specious and able pleading of the Crown Prosecutor; in-spite of the deadly powerful hostile summing up of the judge, the jury had doubts. (It is to their credit that, they had doubts.) They wished to bring in a verdict of indecent assault, which would have been equivalent to an.acquittal. But the Judge suggested that they might find him guilty of an attempt to commit the offence with which he was changed if the facts proved in the opinion m- the jury warranted such a verdict. The jury wisbiug, no do doubt, to meet the views of the Judge accordingly found him guilty of an attempt to have carnal knowledge of the child ; thus recording their opinion _ that the child "had sworn falsely in alleging that the offence had .been com* mitted, and thjit t they doubted the medical evidence. 'This in. fact was finding the prisoner gui'ty, of a crime with he was not ch'ar'gtfd, and with regard to which.not a tittle' of evidence had been adduced. If I-mistake not this amounts, or should amount to, an acquittal. If so, Hazlitt 'ought not to have been sentenced-by Mr Justice Gillies. The jury must have beentastounded when the Judge in spite of testimonials as to character; extending over thirty - five years, proceeded to sentence to the excessively severe punishment of fire years' penal servitude.and thirty lashes. ,The jury probably thought that the sentence would be about twelve months. The Judge's concluding remarlss would have been severe enough if prisoner had been guilty; but how .l ghastly—how horribly unfair they must iave seemed to the prisoner if innocent.. If Judge Gillies had known that Hazlitt had been an invalid for some years, he surely would net have ordered a delicate old man to have the little life that is in him flogged out of. him . If a prisoner is to be flogged, jfc should be with some milder instrument than the horrible cat. A birching, such as a schoolboy gets, would ■ answer, every purpose.. I call upon Mr Sheeban (our member) and Sir George Grey to see —first, that this innocent old man is not flogged, and, secondly, that he is pleased and compensated for the gross injustice that he has suffered.—l am, &c, Geobgb Vidai,.