“POWER CONCERNED IS GERMANY”

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 301, 16 September 1936, Page 9

“POWER CONCERNED IS GERMANY”

Solicitor’s Statement

PRESS SCEPTICAL ABOUT McMAHON’S STORY By Telegraph—Press Assn.—Copyright. (Received September 15, 5.5 p.m.) London, September 15. ’ The Press Association states on reliable authority that the name McMahon wrote down in court was that of the German Embassy. When the report was referred to an authoritative quarter, only comment was: “Does anyone really take this seriously?” Mr. Kerstein, McMahon’s solicitor, told the “Daily Herald”: “The Power concerned Is Germany, I informed the authorities of this plot after hearing about it from McMahon while he was in prison. Following my reports, the King’s French holiday was cancelled and he- went to Eastern Europe instead. Secret Service men verified many of McMahon’s statements. Several officers were subpoenaed to give evidence, but were not called. Meanwhile the question of the King’s safety is being considered.” In a leader, the “Daily Telegraph” says: “McMahon’s story bears every mark of improbability. The notion that any interest of a foreign Power would be furthered by the assassination of the British Monarch.could only be born of a diseased mind. Policemen on the scene fire worthy of all praise for their promptitude in handling an alarming situation, but it is plain from the £rial that a little more official perspicacity would have saved McMahon from folly and avoided public alarm.” “The Times” says: “No Englishman will be inclined to convict a foreign Power of plotting against the King’s life on evidence such as McMahon’s. McMahon is evidently part of the economic wreckage of the day, an intellectual and moral weakling, broken by unemployment and nursing grievances until they became blind rancour against society.”