A BRUTAL ASSAULT.

Westport Times, Volume IV, Issue 666, 2 June 1870, Page 2

A BRUTAL ASSAULT.

A case of wife assault, attended with revolting barbarity, came before the Christchurch Bench on the 16th ult; the prisoner being a middle-aged man, named Edwin Bennett. A remand was applied for, and granted by his "Worship,after hearing thefollowing evidence, bail being refused in any sum until the woman's life was deemed safe:—

Sergt. M'Knight said : On Saturday afternoon, about 5 o'clock, from information received, I went to the prisoner's house in Montreal-street south. I arrived there about ten minutes past five. I went into the bedroom, and saw Mrs Bennett in bed. She was lying on her back, with her head between the ends of two pillows. There was a large quantity of clotted blood about her head, and severe wounds on both sides of her head and face. With the assistanco of two women I raised her up, and she was in such a very weak state that wo had to carry her outside, whence wo took her in a cab to the Hospital. I then went back to the house, and found the prisoner standing outside the gate. 1

told him I was going to arrest him for a violent assault on hia wife. He said, " All right; it is a had job; but what can a man do with a drunken wife ?" I then went into the house again, and in the front room the floor was covered with water and blood. There was a quantity of broken delf about, and I found the cleaver, t;wo hammers, and three pieces of an American broom handle produced, all with blood upon them. There was an American bucket (produced) half full of blood and water. The two pillows stained with blood (produced) were those on which Mrs Bennett was lying. I also found the clothes produced stained with blood. They had been taken off Mrs Bennett before I arrived. There was a second bucket also produced, in which were a number of bloody cloths. I looked around the sitting-room and found blood on all the walls to the height of four feet. The muslin blind produced I found on the window. There is blood upon it and the blood had spurted through on the glass. There was also blood on the door, and the floor was flowing with blood—in fact it was swimming about—whilst lumps of clotted blood were lying in several places. Everything in the room was covered with blood,and almost everythingwaa broken. This concluded the Sergeant's evidence, and the prisoner asking no questions, Inspector Pender applied for a remand for eight days. He said, on enquiry at the hospital that morning, it was found that the woman, though sensible, was in a weak state, and was not out of danger.