NO TRACE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 252, 25 October 1933, Page 8

NO TRACE.

MISSING FARMER. RUAWARO MYSTERY. POLICE SEARCH CONTINUES. (By Telegraph.—Special to "Star.") lIUNTLY, this day. Ten days have gone by, and still there is no trace of Mr. Samuel Pender Lakey, the Ruawaro farmer, who mysteriously disappeared almost simultaneously with the discovery of the body of his wife, Mrs. Christobel Lakey, in a duck pond. Despite intensive police search over a wide area and ceaseless inquiry by Detectives T. Snedden, T. A. Allsopp and J. Findlay, the riddle of Mrs. Lakey's death and the strange disappearance of her husband are still as complex as ever. While a posse of police under Sergeant Bissett scoured the eastern fringe of Lake Whangape, the three detectives prepared official reports yesterday afternoon, and this work was continued this morning. Once again the police set out on a wider search, while at the farmhouse there was the incessant rattle of two typewriters as the detectives tapped out word after word of their official reports to the Commissioner of Police. Already thousands of words have been written, and the file, which is being supervised on the spot by Chief Detective Sweeney, is rapidly growing.

Although it is definitely known that the analysis of the contents of Mrs. Lakey's stomach failed to reveal traces of poison, the strictest secrecy is being observed as to the result of the second post-mortem, and the medical opinion of the cause of her death has not been announced. Blood Stains. There is also a good deal of secrecy about the results of the tests for blood on various exhibits sent to Auckland. It is with the deepest interest that the detectives on the job await the pathological report. As an aid in the detection of crime, the value of testing stains that look like blood is well known, and it is possible to determine not, only whether such stains are blood or riot, but also whether they are human blood, and, if not human blood, to ascertaia. what kind of blood they are. Articles sent to be examined for bloodstains may include clothing, weapons, tools, wood (parts of furniture, parts of doors and floors, walking sticks and clubs), stones, earth and plaster. Bloodstains, when recent, are usually red and older stains cliocolate-brown, but the colour varies with the nature and colour of the material on which the stain occurs and also depends on whether attempts have been made to remove it by washing. On damp fabrics bloodstains sometimes quickly fade and assume a faint greenish 'or bleached appearance. Stains' having similar appearance to those of blood may be due to vegetable juices, fruit juices, rust, paint, coffee, ceiling, wax or dye.