The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1906-04-12
DENIES He
IS EXPERT
DR.. McDonald's Warm
Day on Hypotheti-
cal Question.
Il never said L was an expert.

upon Attorney General Peters, when
the latter was pressing him for posi-
tive opinion on the question of defend
ants sanity, just before the mid-after-
noon recess in the Johnson murder
trial yesterday. The Attorney General
tainted the witness with claiming to
be an expert. and therefore not enti
tied to require definitions in questions.
Then the quoted retort popped out.
1t took long time to get the hypo-
thetical question started The inter-
rogatory fills twelve pages of close
typewriting, with space marked in it
besides for certain medical testimony
i'll full from the stenographers notes.
Mr.. Peters began the fight over it by
Directing to the question as a whole,
both for things omitted and things
contained. What it does contain is
matter that has been adequately re-
ported in the Advertiser from day to
day of the trial.
Judge Robinson did not require
reply from Mr.. Harrison, but ruled
thus: I'VE have spent / day and
half in arranging this hypothetical
question, and the Attorney Generals
objections may properly be the subject
of cross examina ton of the witnesses
called to answer the question. The
objections are overruled.
Mr.. Peters next disputed DIR. Nc
Donalds qualification as an expert and
cross-eXamined the doctor on the mat
ter. Besides his general medical prac-
tice of twenty years, witness said he
had attended the entire course of lee
lures of DIR. Allen Starr, an eminent
alienist, al Columbia University, New
York, in 1898. He took copious notes
of these lectures and studied them as
siduously, though along with other
subjects at the same university on
that occasion.
Judge Robinson overruled the objec-
lions, saying that a rule for experts
here should be less strict than in San
Francisco, where there We're specialists
in all medical branches.
Mr. Harrison having read the hypo-
thetical question, asked what was the
state of mind" of the hypothetical
person described therein.
DR.. McDonald's evidence in reply to
this and succeeding questions, render
ed amidst many battling objections,
was partly to the following effect: 1t
was pretty difficult question to
answer offhandedly. First they want
ed a definition of insanity. Some au-
therities held that imbecility or feeble
mindedness was a species of insanity.
others to the contrary. So far as the
symptoms of the hypothetical person
were given, ell the way through wit
nesses talked of him as silly and most
of them said he was frequently drunk.
Others testified that he was acting
silly when not under the influence OF
intoXicants.
The most important part of the tes-
timony to witness was the fact of his
killing the boy, because he CDR Nc
Donald) could not find any motive for
the killing. Add to that the defective
mentality of the man before and after
the killing of the boy, and he would
have grave doubts of his sanity.
Mr.. Peters was sustained in Directing |
to the use of the word ''delusion'' in a !
question about the lost watch because
there was no mention of ''delusion'' in I
the testimony.
AT the time the subject thought he |
saw the watch in the river, the wit
ness resumed, the testimony was that
he had been drinking A long con-
tinued habit of drinking alcoholics
would predispose him to attacks of
upset his mind-that is,
a man of his caliber. Witness did not
know how long such attacks would
last; it was merely speculation
Mr.. Peters was brought up roundly
by the court when he started his
ross-examinat ton, backing Mr.. Harri-
sons objection that witness had not
said on direct examination that the
subject was insane. 1t came out, how
ever, that, although not in answer to
the hypothetical question, stfbse
quent examination he had said much
the same thing as Mr.. Peters quoted.
From the hypothetical question:
the witness said, Il would not say the
man was insane, but 1 would have
grave doubts of his sanity
Apart from the killing. there was
not enough in the hypothetical ques-
ton to make witness certain that he
was insane, because he might have
been drunk.
You are continually saying apart
from the killing said the Attorney
General. The killing was part of the
hypothetical question:
DR.. Mcdonald asked Mr. Peters to
by insanity. The Attorney General
said it was not his place to give defini-
tions to medical expert.
We'll, there was no motive" the
witness said. There was no reason
for it, nothing in the mans actions
to show any result of logical thought" |
The evidence of the doctor quoted !
(this happened to be his own evidence
in the question: was that the man was
imbecile or feebleninded. Some au.
tborities defined imbecility and feeble
as insanity. Witness
doubted very much if any man in the
world would say that a man was in
sane from anything in the hypothetical
question
Mr.. Peters pressed for an opinion
as to whether or not witness consid-
cred an imbecile or feebleminded per-
son insane
II can not answer that ouestior1 >,