THE "HORSE FIEND" AGAIN.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 9992, 23 March 1898, Page 5

THE "HORSE FIEND" AGAIN.

'"■•*-■ A STALLION KILLED AT HALSWELL. The perpetrator of the horse-stabbing outrages in the Canterbury district has been at his work once more. This time he has chosen the Hals well district as the scene of his operations. On Sunday evening Mr Charles Lewis, senior member for Christchurch city, discovered that his five-year-old thoroughbred stallion Chain Armour (by Chain Shot—Apropos) had been stabbed to death in identically the same manner as in the cases previously recorded. The animal was running in a paddock with some mares about half" a mile or more from the house and about the same distance from the main road, but only about 200 yards from a back road, down which the "horse fiend" probably came. When discovered it had been dead about a day. Mr Lewis yesterday afternoon communicated with the police, and Inspector Cullen, accompanied by Detective Fitzgerald and Constable' Gauutley, at ohce proceeded to the spot. As in tlie other cases, absolutely no clue as to who was the perpetrator could be obtained. The horse, stabbed in the left side of the neck, was lying dead in a paddock. Chain Armour, a bay horse, had met with an injury when a foal, which prevented it from racing. When discovered dead it was lying under some willows in an old water course. The hoi'se had staggered for about 300 yards before falling into the water course, as traces of blood were found only in tbe paddock. Chain Armour was an exceedingly quiet animal, and would come up to anyone entering the paddock. The paddock itself is well grassed, and of course yields no trace or clue to guide the police in their investigations. There were six other horses in the paddock. The wound is about one and a half inches wide and four inches deep. ThU tallies with the measurements of the wounds which have been inflicted in the cases of all the other horses stabbed. Mr Lewis cannot remember when he saw the horse last, so that it may have been dead more thau a day. This make 3 the twenty-third outrage of the kind which has occurred in Christchurch, and the fact of its havings taken place so Sjoftji after the reward for the discovery the felon had been increased to £500 gives colour to the theory that it is the work of someone who'has taken no one into *is confidence; and commits his dastardly deeds alone.