The Gun Alley Tragedy: Record of the Trial of Colin Campbell RossBrennan, T. C. (Thomas Cornelius)
History
The Gun Alley Tragedy: Record of the Trial of Colin Campbell Ross
Brennan, T. C. (Thomas Cornelius)
Ross, Colin Campbell, 1892-1922 -- Trials, litigation, etc.; Trials (Murder) -- Australia -- Victoria -- Melbourne
“If hairs were cast off,” Mr. Price was asked, “would there be any
distinction in their colour as compared with hair that was actually
growing?” “Well, I cannot say that directly,” he replied, “but the
conclusion I formed, as regards the hairs I found on the blanket, was
that they did not come from the frontal portion; that they had not
been exposed much to the light; that they came from the back portion
of the head, and that that is the reason why their colour was not as
deep as those on the front portion.” The two sets of hair, he said,
were “very similar.” Microscopically, they agreed, because there was a
kind of coarseness about them, and when treated with caustic soda it
tended to bring out the pith portion of the hair, “and that pith was
identical with the hairs on the blanket.” The five hairs from the grey
blanket, Mr. Price said, were “similar in colour” to the hairs on the
reddish brown blanket, but that was all he had to say about them. When
being re-examined, he said that his reason for thinking the front and
back of the hair would differ was that in one head he had tested “the
frontal portion was quite red, and the hair from the back of the head
quite dark.”
On cross-examination, Mr. Price admitted that it was “several years”
since he had last made an examination of hairs from any woman’s head.
“It does not often come under my notice,” he added. He had made very
few such examinations in his life. Not only did the hairs from the
child’s head and the hairs from the blankets differ in colour, he said,
but they differed in diameter, and it was possible, but not probable,
that the hairs on the blankets may have come from another head. He had
examined many hairs since he had conducted this particular examination,
and he had, in the course of his examination, found some hairs that
were as like Alma Tirtschke’s as the hairs on the blankets.
It will be shown later that Mr. Price might, on the facts which he
deposed to, have been called as a powerful witness for the defence.
Yet in the atmosphere that prevailed, it seemed to be assumed that his
evidence advanced the case for the prosecution.
THE FINDING OF THE SERGE.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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