Verity, C.J. In this case the appellant was convicted for murder. The facts as represented by the witnesses for the prosecution were that he attacked the deceased, inflicted seven wounds upon him and ran away There was no eye-witness to the actual killing, but the Judge believed that no less than two witnesses saw the appellant run away from the house immediately after this man was killed with a matchet, and that he struck one of these witnesses with the matchet, inflicting a small wound upon him. On these facts, together with the evidence of motive, the trial Judge believed and was satisfied beyond all reasonable doubt that the accused was guilty of this murder.
The only difficulty that appears to have arisen in the course of the hearing of this application relates to an incident at the close of the case for the prosecution. At that stage in the proceedings Counsel for the accused submitted that there was no case to answer, and the trial Judge held that there was a case to answer; in doing so he gave expression to the fact that he might have been disposed to agree with the submission made by Counsel in certain respects, nevertheless, he did hold, and rightly held, on the evidence before him and on consideration of the whole case, that not only was there a case to answer, but that the prosecution had established beyond reasonable doubt the guilt of the accused.
We consider there certainly was a case to answer, and we consider there was ample evidence to justify the conclusion of the trial Judge that the accuaed was guilty of the murder with which he had been charged.
The ground of appeal put forward is that the learned trial Judge misdirected himself with regard to the conclusive nature of the evidence of the third witness.
I do not think that w., have heard a great deal about that ground of appeal in the course of argument. The learned trial judge did not support his conviction upon the conclusiveness of a single witness, but from the whole of the evidence, in so far as he was able to believe it, put forward by the Crown. The fact that he disbelieved part of one witness's evidence does not render the whole of that witness's evidence unacceptable; nor does it affect the credibility of the independent witness who was not involved in this. On the whole of the case, therefore, we cannot say that the verdict is unreasonable or that it cannot be supported by the evidence. There is no misdirection in law. There is nothing in the case to show that there has been a miscarriage of justice, and it is only on those grounds that this Court will allow appeals. The application for leave to appeal is therefore dismissed.
It is, perhaps, unfortunate that considerable argument has arisen in the course of the hearing of this application by reason of the observation made by the learned trial judge at the time at which he held that there was a case for the defence to answer. It is our opinion that as a rule where a submission that there is no case to answer is to be rejected by the trial Judge, his observations should be confined to the ruling, and that it is, as a rule, desirable there should be no observations on the facts of the case at that stage at all.
Appeal dismissed.