THE STOKE SCHOOL CASES.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume III, Issue 90, 29 December 1900, Page 4

THE STOKE SCHOOL CASES.

In spite of the . strong "attempts < so persistently made to prejudica them, the Stoke cases (says the New Zealand Times) have broken : down with a completeness which is,, i when one considers, the difference - between expectancy and fact, \ absolutely staggering. Even had * they been supported by facts, thesa attempts would, from the point of view of fairness and decent legal administration, have been repcshensible, because every attempt to"*j prejudice cases before any Court is ] necessarily improper and indecent. When the facts are fairly well established, and of a kind that inspires any special degree of horror, there is some excuse to < offer for the impropriety and bad taste of comments and insinuation?. ' But in these cases no such pallia tion is possible. There were no : facts. The hue and 'cry of the Press, that ought to have known better how to conduct itself, tutag out to have been led away entirely by vain imaginings. It is impossible to avoid the~ conclusion thai; a ; certain section of the Press of this ■ country wished, above all things, that these charges were true, and is disappointed in consequence. Such j a result ought to be a warning for ,: all time against indisereei com- > menfcs and fussy insinuation? 1 ; concerning pending cases. The A warning wilt be salutary. Had \ the cases been proved »3 com- ■ pletely as they are the " reverse, the comments made and the thingi „' attempted to be done would not have been justified The result is the utter, undeniable, and generally accepted collapse of - the cases, on which "in reality fcha whole proceedings and ail the oufc. cry of the last four months haw hinged.