NOT TO HANG.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 184, 5 August 1936, Page 7

NOT TO HANG.

MAREO REPRIEVED.

LIFE IMPRISONMENT.

DECISION ANNOUNCED,

WIFE MURDER AT AUCKLAND. (By Telegraph.—Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, this day. Sentence of death pronounced on Eric Mareo for the murder of his wife at Auckland has been commuted to imprisonment for life. This announcement was made this morning by the Minister of Justice, the Hon. H. G. R. Mason, aftc-r a meeting of the Executive Council, which considered the sentence.

Arrested on September 2\ 1935, by Detective-Sergeant A. B. Me-iklejohn and Detective J. Hamilton, 011 a charge of murdering his wife, Thelma Clarice Mareo, by the administration of the hypnotic drug veronal, Mareo was found guilty at a first trial held in February of this year. 011 that occasion the jury | brought in a strong recommendation to mercy. On the application of his counsel, Mr. Humphrey O'Leary, K.C., of Wellington, Mr. Trevor Henry and Mr. K. C. Aekins, a new trial was granted on the grounds that fresh evidence was available. 011 June 17 last Mareo was again sentenced to death, the jury 011 this occasion bringing in a verdict of guilty without a recommendation to mercy. Mareo, who is 45 years of age, is the only man ever to have been twice sentenced to death in New Zealand. He was a well-known musician and came into prominence with the production of a musical play, "The Duchess of Dantzic," in which his wife played the leading part. She was 29 years of age when she died.