TRIAL SENSATION.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 252, 25 October 1933, Page 7

TRIAL SENSATION.

QUARREL IN DOCK. Prisoners Accuse Each Other Of Lying. INSURANCE CONSPIRACY. (United P.A.—Electric aelegrapn—Copyright) (Received 11.30 a.m.) PARIS, October 24. The sensational trial, which is in progress at Aix en Provence, was suspended amid scenes of wild disorder. Several charges are being heard against Catherine and Philomene Schmidt, German sisters, who came to France before the war and married two Frenchmen who mysteriously disappeared, and against Georges Sarret, a suave middle-aged Italian-born lawyer of Greek parentage long domiciled in France. It is alleged that the three accused, with accomplices, defrauded insurance companies by taking out policies on the lives of people who disappeared. The three principal accused are alleged, to have disposed of the bodies of two victims by dissolving them in a bath of sulphuric acid. At the hearing to-day Sarret and Catherine Schmidt accused each other of lying. Shaking liis fists, Sarret shouted: "I had 1,000,000 in my pockets and could have disappeared. Instead of that 11 remained." 1 Sarret's daughter gave evidence" confirming the accusations against her father, who buried his face in his hands. The Schmidt sisters maintained that they acted as instruments for Sarret. Catherine cried continuously. p]ventually a violent duel with counsel caused an uproar and the suspension of the hearing.