STORY UNFOLDS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 231, 1 October 1935, Page 8

STORY UNFOLDS.

FREDA STARK'S EVIDENCE.

MAREO MURDER CHARGE HEARING.

ACCUSED BUYS DRUG BARBITONE.

DRAMATIC INCIDENT AT ADJOURNMENT.

Evidence that when Dr. John Dreadon was first called to Mrs. Thelma Mareo on the day of her death, he considered she was suffering from veronal poisoning, was part of the story told by Freda Stark, one of the principal witnesses in the murder charge against Eric Mareo, which was continued in the Police Court to-day. Mr. F. K. Hunt, S.M., is on the Bench.

Miss Stark also made a statement that Mareo had telephoned her the day following his wife's death and had said, "And, Fritters, dear, you will have to be careful what you tell the detectives, or you will have a rope around my neck."

An Auckland chemist told the Court that some time last March, Mareo had bought 25 tablets of the drug barbitone, which was practically the same as veronal. '

When the evidence of Miss Eleanor Brownlee was being heard just before the luncheon adjournment, one of the principal witnesses, Miss Freda Stark, who had been in the box for the greater part of the morning, broke down in Court and was assisted away, weeping.