The Sun.
London, England, 1862-05-14 00:00:00

CRIMINAL COURT-THIS DAY.

OLD COURT.
(Before Mr. Justice Willes.)
John Haines surrendered to an indictment charging him
with the manslaughter of Thomas Mitchell.
The Judge said he did not think there was evidence to
bear out the charge.
The Jury therefore at once returned a verdict of not
guilty, and the defendant was discharged.
ATTEMPTING TO MURDER,
lnbnitrer, cged 40, ,as indicted for
feloniously attempting to murder his wife. There was
also a second indictment, charging him with assaulting her
to do grievous bodily harm.
The prisoner pleaded not guilty.
From the evidence of the wife it appeared that the pri-
soner had been drinking to excess for two or three weeks,
and been unable to go to work, as he Ras suffering from
delirium tremens, and labouring under the delusion that
people were in his room. He continued in this state during
the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. On the evening
of Thursday the 30th of April the wife went to bed about
10 o'clock, but got up at half-past 12 to give the
prisoner his medicine. He then urged her to come
into bed, and immediately she did so he thrust a file
used in sharpening a saw into her stomach. She got the
file from him, Veen he got out of bed and seized an axe,
which was lying among some firewood, and struck her some
blows on the side of the head, inflicting several very severe
wounds. She got away and ran down stairs, when the
prisoner threw the axe after her. The wife was afterwards
taken to St. Mary's Hospital, and the prisoner was con-
veyed to the station-house.
The police-constable said, when he asked the prisoner
why he had injured his wife, he said it was a good job she
got out of the way, or it would have been worse for her.
Dr. Brown, of Kensal.green, said when he examined
the woman he found two incised wounds on the head—one
over the right ear three inches in extent, and one over the
left about an inch. Such an instrument as an axe would
produce the injury. On the abdomen he found a number
of bruises, and also some wounds, as if from a pointed
weapon—a file, for instance. At the station I saw the pri
sonar, and found him labouring under delirium tremens,
and he said he was jealous of his wife with a Jim Cock-
well. A person suffering so severely from delil ium tremens
as the prisoner would, to a great extent, render him incap-
able of knowing right from wrong.
The learned Judge, in summing up the evidence, said he
must impress upon the jury that drunkenness must not be
considered as any excuse for crime.
The jury found the prisoner guilty of unlawful wounding.
Mr. Bibton said the prosecutrix wished to recommend
the prisoner to mercy.
The learned Judge said that was invariably the case ;
the person injured always being most anxious that the
offender should escape punishment. He then sentenced
the prisoner to 18 months' hard labour in the House of
Correction.

NEW COURT.
(Before Mr. Commissioner Kerr.)
UTTERING A FORGED LEASE.

William Claringbold, a respectable man, aged 60, p'eaded
guilty to an indictment charging him with uttering a forged
lease, and obtaining by fraudulent representations the sum
of 4600.
Mr. Commissioner Kerr said he had looked over tho
depositions in this ease, and he found that the prisoner
had obtained a, large sum of money upon the faith
that the deed was a valid document. The person
advancing the money was to receive 20 per cent,
but that did pot afford the slightest ground for altering the
sentence he was about to pass. It was of the highest ioa-
I portance that crimes of the description to which the prisoner
had pleaded guilty should be severely punished, and ho
therefore felt it his duty to sentence him to four years' penal
servitude.
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