ROBBERY OR REVENGE

Evening Star, Issue 14491, 16 February 1911, Page 1

ROBBERY OR REVENGE

In the orly hours of New Year's Day a constable discovered among some furze bushes en Claphaim Common, adjacent to a pathway, the body of a middle-aged man, lying face upwards. A single glance was enough to show that the man had been foully done to death, for in the head were gaping wounds, the left ear nearly torn off, and the battered face smothered in congealed blood. Later, when the corpse came to be examined, knife wounds were found in the stomach and liver, and,. a ; . closj examination of the face revealed the fact that on it, in addition to contusions and cuts, were two very peculiar superficial wounds. Unde 1 * the right eye was an open " S "-shaped cut, through the outer skin only, It was 2iu long, and ran across the right cheek in a downward direction. Lower down was a superficial cut, in a slanting direction, to the middle of the upper lip. There was a similar •' S "-shaped cut on the left side of the face. According to medical evidence, these "S "-shaped cuts had been inflicted after death, and with such mathematical precision lhat the doctors cannot think they could hav-3 been done without the aid of a light. The blows on the bead, which were probably by some heavy metallic object, were sufficient to have caused death without the knife wounds in the body, and the question is: Why should the murderer have lingered over his victim in order to inflict these peculiar "S" cuts? The popular theory, which is not shared by the police, be it said, is that the murder was an act c.f vengeance or. tho part of some secret society, probably associates of the Houndsditch police murderers, wiio suspected the victim to have given information to the authorities concerning the perpetrators of that sensational ciimc.

In these exciting days it is not difficult for the imagination, already fired by Conan Doyle's captivating stories, to conjure up pictures of secret societies, of a terrible vendetta, and the rest of it. And as regards (he Clapham Common murder, coincidences are not wanting to connect it in the public mind v.'ith the recent Anarchist outrages. The victim was one Leon Beron, a Russian Jew, who had lived in England for the past sixteen or seventeen years, and bad succeeded in becoming the owner of nine small houses in St. Gcorges-in-the-East, upon the rents of which he lived. Beron formerly lived in Jubilee street, Commercial road, close to Anarchist clubs known to be frequented by

" I'eter the Painter" and "Fritz." He was last seen aliv? at 1045 p.m. on Dcc:mber 31, at the corner of Fioldrate street, Wh'techapel, waiting for some unknown person. Beron had lmny acquaintances among the Russians and Lett's who lived in Jubilee street, Grove street, and Sidney street, where the Anarchists met their death. The man be was wait ing for that night was, according to inform.'lriim now in the possession of the police, a Polish Jew. A taxicab driver drove Beron, u foreigner, and a woman to the Horns, Keßnington, which is on the way to Clapham Common, on the night of the murder. Beron was not seen alive again after the police first received information on Saturday that ''Fritz'' and another Anarchist were concealed in tin! top attic of Sidney street, which is close to the murdered man's home in Jubilee street. Another coincidence is that "S" is also the initial of the surname of "Fritz Svaars." one of. the two desperadoes who perished in the burning house in Sidney street. These facts lend color to the popular theory that Beron. being suspected of having betrayed Anarchist secrete to the police, was liired to his death on Clapham Common. The police, however, do not seem inclined to pay any attention to the coincidence clue, and are convinced that robbery alone was the motive of the murder. It it known that Beron was in the habit of wearing a good deal of jewellery, and of generally carrying about with him a fair amouni of money. When his body was founrf tWft was nothing upon it save an old rent book, a pipe and pouch, and a cigarette case of small value—London correspondent, January 2.