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the case from the Jury.
3. The point that the Trial Judge refused to withdraw
the case from the Jury on the failure of the Crown to produce
Mary Pine as a witnes8 was a matter for the discretion of the
Trial Judge (R. v. Lewis 2 CAR p. 180) with which we have
no power to interfere. In this case we consider that the
discretion was properly exercised.
4. Another ground of appeal was that the verdict
was against the weight of the evidence. In order to succeed
on this ground it was necessary for the appellant to show that
the verdict was unreasonable and could not be supported having
regard to the evidence.
The evidence adduced on behalf of the prosecution
proved :-
(a) that the five children, one of whom was Michael
Pine, were on the bridge.
(b)
that a very short time afterwards, the time
cannot be stated with exactitude but it cannot have been more
than a few minutes, these five children were found in the
Nullah, two of them, i.e. Tony Flood and Fay Bromley in the
vicinity of the bridge and the other three, 1.e. Norman Stone
and Michael & lígry Pine being carried down the Nullah by the
current.
(c) that the Appellant was the only person seen on
the bridge apart from the five children and was seen to throw
two of the children into the Nullah whom Mrs. Fairburn
believed to be Tony Flood and Fay Bromley, and then drop in
himself.
(a) that the head injury which fractured Michal
Pine's skull and which was the cause of his death was,
according to the medical evidence more consistent with a
fall from a height on to a hard surface than with being
washed against anything in the Nullah.
(e) that the Appellant was observed being washed