BOY FOR TRIAL

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 16, 20 January 1944, Page 7

BOY FOR TRIAL

ATTEMPTED MURDER CHARGE

P.A. BLENHEIM, January 19. The evidence against Allan Joseph Pope, 15, who is charged with attempting to murder Muriel Marguerita. Robertson, widow, of Nelson, at the home of her son-in-law, Arthur Gordon Roberts, of Ward, on October 4, concluded today, and the accused was committed for trial. His counsel, Mr. McNab, intimated that he would like him examined by a psychiatrist in Wellington. In evidence, Arthur Gordon Roberts said that Pope came to him from the Child Welfare Department last July. His behaviour was excellent. Pope asked if Roberts would be agreeable to his having a shotgun, but witness refused, as he was under 16. Pope experimented with invisible inks, and witness tinderstood he was corresponding with a friend in Borstal. Nola Fay McAlpine said that Pope walked into the post office at Ward early on the afternoon of October 4 and asked where the nearest police station was. When informed of it he said: "Tell them to send the van. There has.been a niurde-r committed up the road." She asked "Who?" and he replied, "Mrs. Robertson." Witness asked: "Who did it?" and the accused replied, "I did." He appeared quite normal. Later he said he didn't know why the hell he'd done it. Constable Bourke said that Pope declared he had hit Mrs. Robertson with a spanner three times. On the kitchen floor witness found a bottle similar to the one which Mrs. Robertson in evidence had identified as having contained oil of wintergreen.