WOMAN’S DEATH AT ENFIELD

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 68, Issue 141, 27 March 1948, Page 6

WOMAN’S DEATH AT ENFIELD

Retrial on Murder Charge (P.A.) DUNEDIN, March 26. The evidence of Mrs Carlisle Croft, formerly of Oamaru, and now residing at Stillwater, a witness in the retrial of Phyllis Freeman, who is charged with the murder of Joyce Maisie Morrison, at Enfield, near Oamaru, 1 on October 3, 1942, is to be taken in the Magistrate’s Court at Dunedin before Mr J. D. Wills, S.M., on April 15. Mrs Croft was not called at the lower court hearing of the case against Freeman on November because of the state of her health. At the trial of Freeman in' the. SuCourt the jury disagreed, and a new trial has been fixed for April 27. Freeman is on remand in the Addington Prison,- Christchurch. Application for fixing of the time and place for the taking of Mrs Croft’s evidence was made in the Magistrate’s Court by Mr W. H. Carson, who represented the the Crown. The application Avas granted after evidence had. been given by DetectiveSergeant J. W. Hill, of Oamaru. He paid that in the course of investigations into the alleged murder the police at Greymouth obtained a statement from Mrs Croft, Avhose maiden name Avas McLeod. TJiis statement contained information to the effect that on August 27, 2942, at Oamaru. she Avas employed at • the United Friendly Society’s Dispensary, and that she sold to Phyllic Freeman one ounce of stychnine. Miss McLeod signed the sale-of-poisons hook kept by the dispensary as witness, to' the sale. Detective-Sergeant Hill said that Mrs Croft was not called as a wftness at the lower court hearing because of the state of her health, and the inadvisability of requiring her to travel. The evidence she could tender Avas essential to the Crown’s ease. He added that she Avas subpoenaed for the hearing which began in the Supreme Court on February 3, 1948, but Avas certified by a doctor as unfit to travel.