In the absence of the public witness the evidence of police witnesses pales into insignificance. A witness who: refuses to testify in support of the people who called them or testifies in a way which differs from their previous statement. Argument that the public witnesses do not come forward to support such like recoveries because of risk to their life and liberty nonetheless cannot absolve the police of their heavy responsibility to produce witness from the public. Accused acquitted from the case of recovery of unlicensed klashnikov. Possibility of accused having been implicated with some ulterior motive could not be ruled out. Evidence of police witnesses who were in a way the complainant could not solely be accepted to be relied upon to convict the accused especially when the aforesaid public witness had been abandoned without rhyme or reason. The examiner may ask a hostile witness leading questions. Cross-examination should not go beyond the subject matter of the direct examination and matters affecting the witnesss credibility. The prosecution had thus failed to prove the best evidence by withholding the public witness and an adverse inference could therefore be drawn that in case he was produced he would not have supported the prosecution. A hostile witness is a witness who testifies against the party who has called them to testify. If the witness had not supported the prosecution after appearance he could be declared hostile and subjected to cross-examination by the prosecution to find about the truth but such procedure had not been adopted for reasons best known to the prosecutor. As the witness had not appeared before the Court the record did not show that the witness had been won over. The witness was the only public witness in the recovery proceedings of a klashnikov, others were all police witnesses. A judge has a common law power to declare a witness hostile (or adverse1) and to allow cross-examination by the party who called him. Witness won over: Mere declaration of the prosecution is not enough to abandon such witness.
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