MASS MURDER.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 181, 1 August 1936, Page 4 (Supplement)

MASS MURDER.

TOR INSURANCE CASH. Mass murder for the collection of insurance money is the crime laid at the door of an unnamed gang by the State police at Springfield, Mass. The police are investigating "suspicious" deaths in from 35 to 50 localities during the last 10 years. In each case the deceased was lured into debt and then persuaded to take out a life insurance policy, naming the creditors as beneficiaries. Deatli followed quickly —usually appearing to be accidental.

The present investigation was prompted by remarks made by the coroner at the inquest on a 50-years-old man whoso death was at first reported to have been duo to a "hit-and-run" motor accident. Recent "Accidents." A post-mortem examination, however, revealed, according to tSe district attorney, sufficient arsenic in the body to cause death. "There have been between 35 and 50 suspicious deaths in this neighbourhood in the last 10 years," remarked the coroner. "By suspicious, I mean that many of the deceased were insured by outsiders for sums of money which they would have been unable to carry themselves."

Since then, two other recent "accidental" deaths have been investigated, and, in each case, the post-mortem has revealed a lethal quantity of the same poison in the body.

Special agents from the insurance division of the State police are continuing an inquiry, assisted by the insurance company's investigators who, it is now revealed, have been quietly working on the ca.se for several months.