VERDICT OF GUILTY

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 250, 20 July 1942, Page 6

VERDICT OF GUILTY

Leonski To Be Hanged MELBOURNE, July 17. By a secret written ballot in which, according to the President of the Court, three-quarters of the members concurred, the American soldier Leonski was found guilty on all three charges of the murder of Melbourne women. With all the members concurring, he was sentenced to be hanged. Counsel for the defence, in closing his address, contended that each murder showed the actions of a man with a disordered mind, incapable of reason, plan, or malice aforethought. In io case had there been definite identification of Leonski with the crimes. The Judge Advocate, in reply, said lie was conscious of bis full responsibility when he said that Leonski, by three fiendish and atrocious crimes, had demonstrated himself a . person unfit to live or to continue,to live. Leonski displayed no emotion when the sentence was announced and walked from the room with a strong escort.

PRISONER QUITE CALM

Sentence May Be Delayed (By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright.) (Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, July 19.

The sentence of death by hanging on Leonski may not be carried out for three months. The lengthy procedure io be followed culminates in actual reference of the case to President Hoosevelt before authority can be sent to Australia for the carrying out of the sentence. Leonski is stated to be unperturbed iby the sentence and even to have made grim jokes about it. When he was returned to his cell, he Is reported to have said to his guards: “I am going to give up smoking. It. is bad for the throat.” He added that J.c bad 'been ready to die since be was lb He was anxious to see what was “on the other side."

A good deal of the prisoner’s time in prison and at the trial has been spent in making pencil sketches for which lie has a considerable talent. His cell is decorated with them. They are mostly of women. The trial has aroused tremendous interest throughout Australia. A prominent Sydney psychiarist has suggested that Leonski be kept under observation for a further month to prove beyond doubt his mental condition. The law and medicine, he said, did not see eye to eye on the question of insanity. A sychopathic personality might know what he was doing was v, rong and yet consider himself justified by virtue of certain delusions he possessed. .

The trial has also lifted the curtain cl Melbourne’s liquor trade. The “Mel bourne Herald" says that some Of the revelations of flagrant and open violation of the Licensing Act have been “astonishing and disgusting.” Leonski himself was stated to have consumed 25 beers and four or five whiskies in three hours at. one hotel. Sunday and after hours drinking in hotels were mentioned as a matter of course. The considerable number of young women drinking in hotels was also brought into prominence.