NO INTENT TO KILL

Evening Post, Issue 15, 17 July 1936, Page 9

NO INTENT TO KILL

STATEMENT IN COURT

ACTION AS A PROTEST

CLUB-FOOTED ASSAILANT

(Received July 17, 11.20 a.m.)

LONDON, July 16. A bald man, middle-aged, whose name was not at first announced, limped into the dock at Bow Street. He was of medium height, wore a brown suit and a blue shirt without a collar. He appeared to have a deformity of one Coot, wearing a club-shaped, boot. He

trembled nervously, shifting continually from one foot to the other, and drummed on the side of the dock with his fingers.

Detective-Inspector Sands, after formal evidence of the arrest had been given, asked for a remand till next week. He declared that when the accused was taken in a car to Cannon Row Police Station he said, "It is all the fault of Sir John Simon. I wrote to him last night and 'phoned him this morning:" Later, at the police station, he asked anxiously: "The King wasn't hurt anyway, was he? I did not want to hurt him at all, and only did this as a protest." Detective-Inspec-tor Sands added that the revolver was loaded with ball ammunition in four chambers, but was unloaded in the chamber giving immediate access to the barrel. i"

REQUEST FOR MEDICAL REPORT.

The Detective-Inspector continued: "I was also handed two other rounds of live ammunition, a postcard portrait of the King in a black-bordered envelope, and a copy of a newspaper of today's date on which was pencilled 'May I love you?'"

When charged at Cannon How Police Station the man asked to see a solicitor, who was present in court.

The solicitor rose and asked De-tective-Inspector Sands: "You say that the revolver was loaded in four chambers. There was no evidence that the weapon was fired?"

The Detective-Inspector agreed, and ■added that there was no evidence that it had been fired for a considerable time.

The Magistrate, Sir Rollo Graham Campbell, granted a remand in custody for eight days, adding, "I' think I ought to have a medical report."

The solicitor rose and said: "In view of the Press reports, the prisoner wishes to say there was no attempt at assassination, and no intention of assas-

sination."

It was later disclosed that the accused gave the name of George Andrew Mahon and that he had recently been editing "The Human Gazette." He was living in London.

Hundreds of people waited outside the court in a solid mass on three sides of the building. The Court adjourned and was cleared after the end or ordinary business, and reopened ten minutes later, the doors being heavily guarded. A police clerk informed the Press that no photographs would be permitted after the conclusion of the proceedings.

Mahon was kept in court for half an hour, and meanwhile the crowd increased. The police arranged a strategic getaway in a big powerful saloon car, a hundred police standing shoulder to shoulder to keep back the crowd, who jeered and cat-called as it drove away. Scotland Yard states that only Mahon was arrested.