A SPECTATOR 'S NOTEBOOK
FROM one point of view it is as well that the trial of John George Haigh only lasted two days, for the inroads reports of
• the trial made on the popular newspapers' limited space have been enormous. The censorious will no doubt be swift to judge, and it will be surprising if the Haigh reports are not cited in next week's debate on the Royal Commission on the Press as evidence of the papers' sensationalism and morbidity. On the whole the papers have a good defence. There are elements about this case which invest it with abnormal interest—first and foremost the method Haigh adopted for the disposal of the body—always the most baffling problem for a murderer. Then, of course, there were Haigh's claims, true or false, to have been responsible for half a dozen other murders ; the question—the one crux of the whole trial—of Haigh's sanity ; the evidence given in regard to that by the single witness called for the defence, the psychiatrist, Dr. Yellowlee.s, and the Judge's obvious reservations about this expert evidence. Here, as in all cases, a real difficulty arises. The value of the opinion of a distinguished psychologist or psychiatrist is not to be doubted, but it must be given its proper weight and no more. I have known cases, generally in lower courts, in which justice seems to be handed over to the psychiatrist. It is not enough, even in perplexing cases, for the psychiatrist to say that the accused person is abnormal, and needs treatment, not punish- ment. That is no doubt sometimes true, but by no means always. Plenty of people who "couldn't help it" could have helped it perfectly well if they had tried hard enough. While the psychiatrist in the courts has helped a lot it is by no means all help. Meanwhile the newspapers, after their crime-honeymoon, must now turn back to the dock-strike and the economic crisis for their high lights. The diet may be more salutary in the circumstances, but the average reader will hardly think it more attractive.
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