Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 June 1875 — Cases of Mistaken Identity in the English Coarts. [ARTICLE]

Cases of Mistaken Identity in the English Coarts.

It is not seldom that even British justice gets hold of the wrong person. Cases of mistaken identity are by no means rare In the courts. A singular instance of this happened to a London young woman, who was beguiling the tedium of life by a sojourn at Brighton. Mrs. Hoddv was, it would appear, employed in a" restaurant in the “ city.” On Good Friday she departed for the pleasant sea-side resort with her mother and a female friend. It was Sunday evening. The three London ladies had been sauntering on the pier; and toward eleven in the evening Mrs. Hoddy was hying her to her .lodgings in Russell street. A stranger came up to her abruptly and accosted her. He went so far as to touch her on the shoulder, and to give her the information that “ he had seen her before.” She declined to recognize him as anyone she had ever seen, and, as he persisted in following her, she appealed to a policeman for protection. She got to her lodgings and retired. Scarcely had she gone to sleep, however, before her landlady roused her with the intelligence that a policeman was waiting below to take her into custody. Unable to credit her senses, the amazed Mrs. Hoddy dizzily descended to the guardian of the law. To her further surprise she found, in company with the policeman, the young man who had addressed her in the street. What followed fairly overcame her with astonishment. In presence of the policeman, the stranger charged her with having, on the Sunday night before, caught him round the waist and robbed him of a wallet with five pounds in it. In vain did poor Mrs. Hoddv declare her innocence. She was rudely jostled out of the house and the policeman “pushed her along” till they reached the lock-up. The complainant stated to the magistrate that he was a tailor of New Burlington street, London. He repeated the charge of theft. Here comes one of those cruelties of English procedure which cast a stain on the so-much-boasted British justice. The young woman was refused bail; and not only were there no inquiries made as to where she had been on the SUhday evening when the robbery was alleged to have taken place, but she w&s treated as a prisoner proved guilty. She was examined by a “female searcher;” she was locked up iU a cell and kept there two days and two nights. Finally she was committed for trial; and, being consigned to Lewes jail, the additional indignity of riding from Brighton to Lewes on the outside of the prison-van was put upon her. At Lewes she was. forced to put on the jail garb, placed in solitary confinement and forced to use penal bread and water. Meanwhile it occurred to the prosecutor, Mr. Sydney Landon, that very possibly he had made a mistake. After Mrs. Hoddy had been immured in> jail several weeks, and on the very day before her trial at the assizes came on, he withdrew the charge and tendered an “apology.” This, naturally enough, was not accepted. The outraged Mrs. Hoddy b.rought arf action for false imprisonment and a jusf‘jury awarded her damages to the extent of $1,400. Another case of mistaken identity occurred in London. One Mr. Chapman was sitting in his library one day when his brother came in and handed him a letter, brought to the door by a woman. The letter professed to be a recommen-

dation from a clergyman in favor of a deserving lady named Ridge. The generous Mr. Chapman promptly drew a check for five pounds in favor of this lady. It afterward turned out that the letter had been forged, and that Mrs. Ridge denied all knowledge of the transaction. It became necessary to identify the bearer of the forged letter. Mr. Chapman’s suspicions fell upon a Mrs. Laurens, a neighbor of Mrs. Ridge. That dame was therefore beguiled into paying Mrs. Ridge a call. Mr. Chapman’s butler, being concealed there, asserted that Mrs. Laurens was the bearer of the letter, whereupon she was promptly arrested! She was brought up in the Police Court, remanded, locked up for a week, and at last discharged for want of proof. The outraged lady at once brought a suit for false imprisonment, clearly proved her entire innocence, and received twentyfive pounds damages. A singular blunder came near being made by the magistrate of the Dublin Police Court a few months, ago. Two hackmen were arraigned before him charged with having murdered an unknown gentleman. The principal witness was a woman, who swore that she saw the victim talking with them one dark night. They appeared to be demanding money of him. Presently he went off toward the canal, the hackmen following him; and soon she heard a splash and a shriek and saw the two men hurrying away. The gentleman had disappeared. Witness ran and caught up with the hackmen, and charged them with murder, whereon they felled her senseless to the earth. They were arrested, the canal was dragged in vain, and the prisoners were brought up for examination. The case seemed proved beyond a doubt. The magistrate, his mind made up, was about to commit the murderers tc trial, when he asked if they had any observations to make. To the surprise of everybody one of the supposed murderers spoke up thus: “Is it observations, yer Honor? Faix, then, there’s the murthered man thia blessed minute standin’ anenst ye!” Sure enough a gentleman stepped forth, and, giving his name as Robb, declared that he was the person referred to by the witness, and that the hackmen “ had showed him his way home by the canal in a most obliging manner.” The prisoners were set free, and the woman took their place in the dock, charged with perjury.— Applctons' Journal.