BODY FOUND IN SCRUB

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26039, 16 February 1950, Page 4

BODY FOUND IN SCRUB

Man With Gunshot Wound In Chest

DEAD MAN’S CAR MISSING

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, Feb. 15.

With a gunshot wound in the chest, the body of Frederick Stanley Hodson, aged 59, a married man, bacteriologist, at the factory of the Rangitaiki Plains Dairy Company, Ltd., at Edgecumbe, was found covered with sand, scrub, and tins behind manuka bushes a few yards from the edge of Grieves road, Onepu, at 8 p.m. yesterday. A large party of police and detectives from Gisborne, Auckland, and Whakatane to-day began intensive investigations. No weapon has been found and a widespread search is being made for Wlr Hodson’s missing car. The police are also trying to find a missing Edgecumbe resident. Mr Hodson had .been bacteriologist at the Rangitaiki Plains dairy factory, the second largest in New Zealand, for 17 years. Before that he was bacteriologist at the New Plymouth Hospital. Farmers and • members of the company’s staff describe him as a popular officer. Mr Hodson travelled to the factory every day from his home at Lake Rotoma, about 20 miles away. He generally used the service car, but occasionally used his own car. Police Notified in Morning About 8.30 a.m. on Monday* he left for the factory in his car. When he did not return home that evening Mrs Hodson became anxious, but she was unable to notify the Whakatane police until yesterday morning. No clue to Mr Hodson’s disappearance was received until last evening. It came from an Edgecumbe carrier, Mr T. H. Anderson, who had driven his truck from Edgecumbe along Grieves road on Monday morning to pick up some pigs in the Onepu district. About 10 a.m. he noticed Mr Hodson’s car run off the road into the manuka scrub, but he did not pay particular attention to it. On his return journey to Edgecumbe about an hour later the car was not there. Mr Anderson reported this to the police when he learned last evening of Mr Hodson’s disappearance. Accompanied by Constables Julian and D. Jones, of Whakatane, he went to the spot at which he had s£en the car. Mr Hodson’s body was found a few yards away, covered with sand, scrub, and tins, apparently in an attempt to disguise it as a rubbish heap. Road Lined Witji Scrub

Grieves road is used as an alternative route to the Te Teko-Edgecumbe highway, but it carries relatively little traffic. Manuka scrub lines both sides of the road, and it hid the body from direct view from the road. The body was found 200 yards from the main’ road turn-off, and a few yards from the roadside beyond it was a belt of pines and an area of ground cleared for the Onepu Domain tennis courts.

There is no house within 100 yards and no one heard a shot on Monday morning.

About 6 a.m. on Monday a man had been seen on a bicycle in the Te Teko district, and in the next two or three hours several persons saw him walking about. Mr R. F. Duckworth, who said he saw the man walking on the main road toward Rotorua about 7.45 a.m., said he was not armed. At 10 a.m. the man was seen near Mr Hodson’s car. A bicycle was discovered under the pine trees close to Mr Hodson’s body. Petrol Obtained for Car Mr Hodson’s car, driven by the same man, called at Te Teko Motors’ garage and the man obtained five gallons of petrol. When the car left it was going towards Rotorua. Although an extensive police search ha's been made of the Whakatane and surrounding districts, the car has not yet been found. It could be several hundred miles from Te Teko by now. An inquest into the death of Mr Hodson was opened by the Coroner (Mr C. S. Armstrong) this evening. Evidence of identification was given and the inquest was adjourned sine die.

The body was later taken to Rotorua. where a post-mortem examination will be made by Dr. Walter Gilmour, the Auckland pathologist.