Fourth Group

Biologists of the State Medical Department of Wuerttemberg analyzed, last week, blood samples taken from a man, a young woman, a babe. Impersonal, they reported that the man and the young woman belong to the second "blood group," while the child belongs to the fourth. Summing up, they wrote: "A child invariably inherits its blood group characteristics from one or the other parent. As, in the present case, neither the mother's nor the alleged father's blood shows the characteristics found in the child, the only conclusion possible is that parentage by the accused man is excluded."

This report was accepted last week by the lower criminal court at Ellwangen, Wuerttemberg, when it handed down for the first time a verdict based on the blood test method of determining parentage. The court, thoroughgoing, suppressed all names, to protect the honor of the man unjustly accused, then sentenced the scheming young woman to six months' imprisonment.