The Sun.
London, England, 1864-03-05 00:00:00

ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE,

HOME CIRCUIT.—HEETFORD, March 4.
(Before the Lord Chief Baron.)
EXTRAORDINARY CHARGE or ROBBERY.

Samuel Wabey, 25, was charged with stealing £3 in gold
and other moneys, the property of Edward Foreman, since
deceased.

Mr. Taylor prosecuted ; the prisoner was defended by
Mr. Codd.

The circumstances under which this charge was preferred
against the prisoner were of a very unusual character, he
having been in the first instance charged with the crime of
wilful murder, and the circumstantial evidence that was
brought forward in support of that charge was of such a
character, that but for the circumstance of a witness named
Carroll, who happened accidentally to pass the deceased
whilst in a dying state before the prisoner could have had
anything to do with him, in all human probability he would
have been convicted of that crime, and paid the penalty of
his life for it, the facts proved being of such a description
that no one would have doubted that the conviction was
a just one, The deceased was a young man, a miller by
occupation, and resided near the town of Hitchin, at a mill
called Charlton Mill, and it was his habit to go to different
places collecting money once a week. He started upon this
expedition on the day he met with his death, with a white
mule, a very fast animal, and a cart, as was his custom,
and before he set out his wife gave him two pounds in gold
and silver to enable him to give change, this money being
wrapped up in a white linen bag. He sot out about 3 o'clock
in the afternoon of January 11, and went to a village called
Offiey and other places, and was paid various sums of money
by different persons, amounting altogether to £9, and
stetted to return home shortly before 7 o'clock in the even-
ing. 'What occurred after this was never very clearly ascer-
tained, but about 7 o'clock in the evening he was seen near
a place called Preston, and the mule, very shortly after-
wards, was heard to break into a gallop, as though it had
run away, and about two miles from this spot the mule and
cart were stopped, the deceased hiving at this time either
fallen or been thrown out of the vehicle. At 9 o'clock a
baker named Carroll, passing by a place called Preston-hill,
found the unfortunate man lying in the middle of the road,
and snoring or breathing very hard, and he appeared to have
attempted to rouse him but could not do so, and went on his
way, and at a short distance met the prisoner \Vabey, ac-
companied by a lad named Joseph Harmer, his brother-in-
law, and he told him there was a man lying in the road, and
to this fact the prisoner probably owed his escape from being
tried for the murder, as it turned out that the injuries re •
ceived by the deceased were as much to be attributed to blows
from a bludgeon or other blunt instrument as to a fall. The
prisoner seemed to have told Carroll that he should not
meddle with the man, but according to the evidence given by
the boy Harmer before the magistrate, when they got up to
the place where deceased was lying, the prisoner first t urned
him over, and said he did not know who ho was, and then
felt down his clothes, and told the boy to go on, and in a few
minutes rejoined him, and said that " he had got his --
money," and showed him something in a linen bag, This
boy, when he was now examined, evidently attempted to
screen the prisoner, and represented that he did not know
what it was the prisoner showed him, but the other evidence
established in the clearest possible manner that the prisoner
had committed a most cruel and heartless robbery upon the
unfortunate man while he was lying in a dying state. The
deceased seemed to have lain three or four hours in the road
before any assistance was rendered him, and he was then re-
moved to the Hitchin Infirmary, where it was found that the
whole of his money was gone ; and this at first gave rise to
the suspicion that a murder had been committed, and the
prisoner and the boy Harmer were taken into custody. It
was proved that before the day in question the prisoner
was in distressed circumstances, and in arrears for rent, but
that on the night the robbery was committed he changed
two or three pieces of gold, but that on the following day he
took the boy to St. Albans, leaving his work, upon a plea.
sure expedition, and paid all his expenses. Besides this, it
appeared that his smock frock was bloody, and that when
he was questioned he denied having seen the deceased at all
on the night he met his death, but it appeared that he did
afterwards say to one of the witnesses that he saw the de-
ceased on the road, and that he thought his brains had
been knocked out, but he denied having touched him,
and said that his reason for this was that he had once got
into trouble through having interfered with a drunken man.
It was also proved that when the police searched the pri-
soner's cottage they found four sovereigns wrapped up two
and two in separate pieces of linen concealed in a dress
belonging to the wife of the prisoner, and she could not give
any account of how this money came into her possession,
There were the principal points in the evidence against the
prisoner, but there were a variety of other little circum-
stances which left no doubt whatever of his guilt, aed it
also seemed extremely probable that if, instead of plunder-
ing the unhappy man, the prisoner had obtained assistance,
hie life might possibly have been saved,
_ _

Mr. Codd made an able address to the jury for the prisoner.
and he endeavoured to show that during the many hours the
unfortunate deceased had lain upon the road he might have
been robbed by some other person, and that the money
disposed of by the prisoner was his own savings.
The Lord Chief Baron having summed up,
The jury almost immediately returned a verdict of guilty.
His lordship, in passing sentence, told the prisoner that
he had boen convicted of a very cruel offence, and the evi-
dence against him was perfectly conclusive. The crime of
robbery from the person was under any circumstances a
serious crime, but in the present case there was this aggra-
vation, that the prisoner had robbed a man who, according
to his own story, he found lying upon the road with, as ho
thought, his brains knocked out, and instead of endeavour-
ing to render him any assistance, he plundered him of all
the money he had about him. Under these circumstances
he should sentence him to be kept in penal servitude for
four years.

The learned judge then ordered the boy Harmer into
custody, in order that he might be taken before a magistrate
to be dealt with either as having been concerned in the rob-
bery, or for the wilful perjury which, he said, there was no
doubt he had committed.

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