He proceeded to say that if the jury believed the circumstantial evidence which showed the prisoner to have been at Bannercross from seven o’clock up to ten minutes past eight—which traced him across that field, and found on his path a packet of letters, they could not but believe that the prisoner was the man who fired the shot which killed Mr. Dyson.
With what intent did he do it? Did he do it maliciously and with the intent to do the full charge mentioned in the indictment? With what object did he go from Darnall to Ecclesall, hanging about the house, threaten Mrs. Dyson, and tell Brassington the scandalous story of which they would hear?
Did all that point to malice, to malignity, to hate? He thought it did. If the jury came to the conclusion that it was the hand of prisoner who shot poor Mr. Dyson, and if they found that the motive which prompted him to do it was a malicious and a premeditated motive, then he thought they could come to no other conclusion than that the prisoner committed the crime charged, and that he did it with malice aforethought.
Mr. Johnson, of the firm of Holmes and Johnson, architects and surveyors, of Sheffield, produced a plan of Bannercross, showing the house in which Mr. Dyson lived, and the gardens and fields adjoining.
MRS. DYSON’S EVIDENCE.
Mrs. Dyson, whose appearance in the witness-box aroused great interest in court, said she was the widow of Arthur Dyson, who was shot at Bannercross in 1876.
She lived with her husband in Britannia-road, Darnall, and at that time the prisoner resided in the next house.
She knew him then as Charles Peace, a picture-framer, and he frequently visited their house until her husband, annoyed at his visits, sent him a card requesting him not to annoy his family.
In July of the same year the prisoner threatened to blow out their brains, and put a pistol within six inches of her face.
No. 92.