Disquiet at the treatment of Ms Noodles Goodbody at yesterday's kidnapping case at Stoborough Green Crown Court boiled over into anger today as questions were asked about the role of Ms Justice E Kwallwrights who had dismissed all charges against Noodles's kidnapper - 63 year old Mrs Edwina Scoops of 41 Cloacle Street, Puncknowle - without bothering to seek the jury's verdict in the matter. A campaign launched on Ms Goodbody's behalf by the Sydling St Nicholas Sun - dubbed "Free the Tincleton Two"* - has already attracted over 100,000 signatures.
*Possibly a mistake as there is only one Noodles Goodbody - who does indeed live in Tincleton - with [on occasion] love rat and former Territorial Army Reservist (Catering Division) Mr Melvyn Scoops. The matter was raised with the Sydling St Nicholas Sun's Page 3 editor Gorr Blimey who suggested we were, perhaps, missing the point(s). [Ed]
Readers of the popular Dorset paper were asked to take part in a poll designed to discover on whose side sympathy lay. The vote currently stands at Noodles Goodbody [5,400] - Edwina Scoops [4]. Voting closes at 5pm today.
A spokesperson for the Dorset Department of Justice admitted today that "the intervention of a judge in a case and his or her direction of a jury as to the verdict which they should reach is neither unprecedented not uncommon. However, there is a school of legal opinion that might hold that Ms Justice Kwallwrights went a little further than the law strictly allows by declining to consult the jury altogether and we will of course be looking into the matter. That said, Ms Justice Kwallwrights is a friend of the former defendant and that too should be taken into account. The Law must be impartial but it should never be unfeeling and surely friendship is to be encouraged rather than punished. At the end of the day it is a matter of judgement, or perhaps like ice cream in this hot weather - a matter of taste. Speaking of which ... two scoops or one?"
Today 's Sydling St Nicholas Sun, which consonant with its string investigative record, has asked for a public inquiry into the actions of Ms Ms Justice E Kwallwrights in yesterdays Regina v Scoops case. Asked if Justice should not be blind, the judge had allegedly replied, "No ... just a little short-sighted sometimes".