YOUNG WOMAN CHARGED WITH MURDER

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 255, 22 July 1920, Page 4

YOUNG WOMAN CHARGED WITH MURDER

COMMITTED FOR TRIAL. A young woman named Agnes Eliza Mepham was charged in the Magistrates Court vesterdav, before Mr. \W G. l!iddell, S.M., with hnving, on _ June !», at Johnsonville, murdered her infant male child. Mr. C. A. L. Treadwoll appeared for tho accused. Tho body of the child was found anions some blackberry bushes near .fohnsonville. Dr. C. Jf. Hector, who made the post-mortem examination, said that the infant had been asphyxiated through a piece of tape being tied round its neck. The accused, when seen by •Detective Andrews, admitted that she had inven birth to a child somo time during Ihe second week in .Tune, and Hint she had placed (he bodv in the spot where it was found. The nccused reserved her defence, and was committed to (lie Supreme Court for trial. The adjourned inquest. on the infant was held immediately after, and the evidence, was the same as that Riven at. tho hearing of the charge against the mother. The Coroner (Mr. Riddell) said that ho would return an open verdict, but in accordance with the medical evidence, and found that the unnamed child died on JUinc 9, tho Uaus-c of death being asphyxiation due to a pieco of tape bcinff tied round it? neck 600H after birth.