CONCLUSION OF EVIDENCE

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 63, 17 March 1925, Page 5

CONCLUSION OF EVIDENCE

DR. SPiLSBURY REBUTS

THEORY OF SUICIDE.

(UNIFED PRESS ASSOCIATION. COPIRIQIT.)

(AUSTRALIAN-HEW ZEALAND CABLI ASSOCIATE.) (Received 17th March, 10 a.m.) t LONDON, 16th March.

At the trial of Norman Thorne for the murder of Elsie Cameron, evidence for the defence lias concluded.

Dr. Nabarro, Director of the Pathological Department of the Great Orinorid Street Hospital, and Dr. Gait, Professor of Legal. Medicine at Glasgow, deduced from the examination of microscopic slides that the marks on the neck of tho body_ were consistent with the theory of hanging.

Sir Bernard Spilsbury, Government Pathologist, recalled, said that there would bave been no puckering of the eyes or contraction, such as Thorne described in Miss Cameron's eyes when he saw the body hanging. The witness emphasised that the grooves in the neck could not have been caused by the string described by Thorne. Sir Bernard produced miscroscopic slides prepared from samples' of skin handed to him by Dr. Bronte, and said that the post-mortem changes were most marked, which was inevitable so long after death. Consequently, the details and structure were largely destroyed. Tile slides contained no evidence of injuiy causable by suspension. The witness said that the'injury to the cheek could not have been caused by the head striking the suitcase as the prisoner suggested. The mere falling of the body could not have produced the crushing of the tissues. "■

Dr. Gait, recalled, said that staring eyes -were quite common with a person hanged.