FOUND GUILTY OF MURDER

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26039, 16 February 1950, Page 6

FOUND GUILTY OF MURDER

MAN SENTENCED AT WANGANUI

STRONG RECOMMENDATION TO MERCY (New Zealand Press Association) WANGANUI, February 15. The jury in the Supreme Court at Wanganui to-day found Alexander Lennie Soper, a butcher, aged 41, of Manutahi (Taranaki) guilty of the murder of Ivy Monica Marsh, otherwise known as Soper, at Pokaka (near Ohakune) on January 24. The jury made a strong recommendation to mercy. Soper was sentenced by Mr Justice Smith to imprisonment with hard -labour for life.

“I have nothing to say,” Soper said after the jury had announced its verdict.

“I. agree entirely with the jury’s verdict,” said his Honour. “I can see no other verdict that could be returned in the circumstances.”

Before his Honour summed up to-day the foreman asked: “Is there any reason why the accused and Mrs Marsh could not have married?”

His Honour replied that no evidence on that point had been offered and the jury would have to deal with the case on the evidence brought before it. Summing up his Honour sab’ that on the question of intent that the jury had to look at the whole of the evidence. The jury had to take into account not only Soper’s statements but also his actions.

Murder could be reduced to manslaughter by what was called provocation —if the person who caused death did so in the heat of passion caused byprovocation. Provocation was a wrongful act or insult of such a nature as to deprive an ordinary person of the power of self-control, provided the offender acted on sudden impulse and before there was time for that passion to cool. Doing what one had legal right to do was not provocation. His Honour questioned whether provocation could arise in this case. The facts had been presented with complete fairness by ihe Crown, said his Honour, who warned the jury that there was a distinction between the statements made in the witness box under oath and those made to another person who recounted them to the Court.