THREE TIMES TRIED.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVI, Issue 12, 14 January 1905, Page 13

THREE TIMES TRIED.

■i I'IXAL CHAPTER IN A GRCESOATE i MURDER. LONDON. December s>. The trial and condemnation, at Belfast j last Saturday of Joseph Fee, the Clones ; pork butcher, for the murder of John Flan- i ; agan, a local egg and poultry dealer, in the J I April of 1903, brought to an end one of the j ' most sensational murder trials in criminal j ! history. This was Fee's third trial. On j two previons occasions at the Monaghan , assizes, juries had disagreed, and most I people imagined that the Crown would give the prisoner "the benefit of the doubt" and let him go. But. deeming the circumstantiaJ evidence very strong —as indeed it was —the Crown determined to change the venue of the trial to Belfast, and at t.h« third time of asking secured a verdict against the accused. Kee's victim was quite a yonng man. He lived a. little way out of Ckmes, a small market town some 12 miles from Mooaghan, jand on April 16th attended Clonee market with £80 in notes and gold in hie poeeesRion and a cheque for £50. He cashed the latter and shortly afterwards met Pee, and was seen to go with the butcher to his slaughterhouse. lie was never seen alire again, aud not one of the purchases he was known to hare contemplated was ever made. Eight months afterwards Fee employed a young man named McCoy to clear ont a manure heap at the rear of his slaughterhouse. Digging rather deeper than j usual, McCoy turned up a boot with a ' human fool in it. Further digging revealed the body of Flanagan. Fee was arrested, and evidence soon began to accumulate against him. On the day of Flanagan's '• disappearance Fee had bought a pig-killing knife and a spade, aud in his possession when arrested was a purse sworn to as having belonged to Flanagan, whilst during his trials other items telling heavily against ' the accused cropped up. On Saturday an j ' attempt to prove an alibi failed, some of ' ' the defence witnesses being under the in- i I fluence of drink aud unable to appear. The j i jury after half an hour's deliberation found : a verdict of "Guilty," and on December i Fee will pay the penalty of his crime. ! ] Instances of a prisoner's conviction on a j i charge of murder, after two previous dis- : agreements, are extremely* rare in our cri- j rainal annals. There were two disagree- : ' incuts In the notorious Peasenhall case, and ' after the second abortive trial a "nolle ; ' prosequi" was decided on, and (lardinet, j ! who had DPver ceased to protest his inno- ! : ceuce. was released. The Ouiagh murder iin IS7I is in some respects a striking paralild to the Clones affair. A sub-inspector !of police, named Montgomery, was tried I for the brutal murder of a Mr Glass, at I Newlon-Stewart, Ireland, the first jury disi agreeing after a hearing of V 2 days. The I evidence was, however, too strong to be disregarded, anil Montgomery was again j put upon trial, with no more decided result than before. A third trial was ordered, j and in July, 187:5, the sub-inspector was at i last, convicted. He confessed his crime the ■ same day, and was duly executed. i