MURDER OF A FRENCH JOURNALIST

Evening Star, Issue 15480, 30 April 1914, Page 9

MURDER OF A FRENCH JOURNALIST

* COOLLY PLANNED. ENGAGEMENT AT EMBASSY CANCELLED TO DO RED DEED. The Gaillaux menage—both wcr© married botote and fox somo time past an extraordinary one. At. CaiKaux himself is .a man of suoh nervous temperament as to bo almost hya.tQricaJ, and. has boon said to take drugs. There is a great suspicion thac Madame Oaillaux baa the stumc habit. The 'Figaro' campaign against M. Caillauji; had .wrought his nerves to the pitch pf exasperation, and he and his wife were said, lately to have had constant quarrels, due fco~ the state, of their nerves. At length came the attack which precipitated' the orash. Tho woman, cowering and trembling in her home, fearful as to what each new issue of the 'Figaro' would forth, found at last that a lady was -dragged in, in the form of an extract from a letter to her from M. Ciiillaux. The letter was. signed "Thy Jo." There is no doubt that the publication of this private letter exasperated Madame Caillanx to the highest degree It. is reported that at the police station after tha murder she said that the letter had been written to her when she was still the wife of Leo Claretio. The 'Figaro,' on the other hand, distinctly states that tho letter bad not bcpn written to her, but to another lady. It is impossible as yet to say which statement is right. At anj rate, the. dragging into the dispute of such private documents envenomed it to a dangerous degree. Madame Caillain, rightly or\wrongly, imagined that further correspondence of the kind was to be published, and the fiery Frenchwoman resolved fco end a persecution she could no longer .endure. In publishing the "Dear Jo" letter, M. Cahnette unconsciously signed his own death warrant. On the day of the tragedy M. Caillaux had a few intimate friends to dejeuner. Mme Caillaux was more excited and nervous . than usual. She left her husband and walked about the apartment, exclaiming:.. "This odious campaign must end; can nothing be done? Is there no justice in France?' M. Caillaux left soon after dejeuner, so did the guests, and Mme Caillaux lost no time m completing her arrangements for taking her part in the dispute. Entering a motor car, she was driven to the Palais ds Justice. t?he appealed to the officials, but they could do nothing. Mme Caillaux, on leaving the Law Courts, drove to a gunsmith's. There she —Purchased a Browning Pistol—and cartridges. Arriving home, she rang up the Italian Embassy, and explained to Mme Tittoni that she would bo unable to attend the' evening banquet at the Embassy. Loading her newly-purahased pistol, Ijtfrne Caillaux then drove to the office of the ™ Figaro' in her car. It was then 'about 5 o'clock. M. Calmetto was out. Mme Caillaux, waited in the waiting room for over an hour, her pistol concealed in her muff. Her cold determination did not weaken. At about a quarter past six M. Cahnette, accompanied by M. Paul Bourget, reached the office, and went for a few seconds into his office. As be came out the page boy (Adricn Cirao) presented Mme Caillaux's card in an envelope, for the visitor had not wished her name to be known to any but the recipient. M? Calmette glanced at it, started, and showed it to M. Paul Bourget. "You won't see her," said the latter. "What is the use?"- "She is a lady," said M. Calmette, " I must see her." M. Bourget shook hands with M. Cahnette and left him. M. Calmette ret-irned to his office. Cirao introduced tie visitor and shut the door. A few moments later shots rang out. _ They •sounded, says a -reporter of the 'Figaro, like the striking of a ruler on the desk very sharply. Then came a rush into the editor's room and the discovery of the tragedy. In all Mme Caillaux fired six shots, but M. Calmette, realising his danger, rushed for shelter behind his office desk. He was too late, for bullets struck him before he could reach cover. Two struck him in the chest, one in the abdomen, and a fourth in the thigh. The injured man collapsed in a heap on tho floor Mme Caillaux. it is the unanimous testimony of eye-witnesses of the scene, was calm. "Let me alone," she said to Cirac, who had 6eized her arm. "I won't fire any more. I won't try to escape. I am a lady; my motor is waiting for me downstairs. I am. quite ready to get into it and go to the police station." She was led away to another room, while friends busied themselves about her hardly conscious victim. Poor Calmette was hurried away to a nursing home. But all the skill of Paris did not avail to. avert his doom, and in a little while he was dead. Meanwhile tho > Minister's wife had been removed to the police station, and M. Caillaux summoned. "I am the Minister' of Finance,,' he said to the sergeant who -introduced him; " salute me." He was introduced into the room in which his wife sat. What passed in that short and terrible interview who can say, hut. at length the interview was over, and Mme Caillaux was introduced into the commissary's presence and questioned. "Why did you shoot M. Calmette?' asked the Magistrate. "I wished to take justice into my own hands," was the answer. "Explain yourself," said the Magistrate. "I was enraged by the campaign o c M. Calmette against my husband. I wished to put an end to it.' I did not mean to till M. Calmette, but merely to give him a lesson."

•M. FABEE'S STORY. OFFICIALS VERSION OF GRAVE CHARGES OF CORRUPTION. The report of M. Fabre, the' Public Prosecutor, is given as follows: Called by the Minister of Justice on Wednesday, March 22, 1911, I was summoned by M. Monis, the Premier, who wished to speak to me on the Rochette affair. He told me that the Government were anxious that the case should not come before the Court on April 27, the dato fixed long previously, as it might be embarrassing to the Minister of Finance at the moment when he already had his" hands full. . . . The Premier ordered me to obtain from the President of the Correctional Chamber the postponement of tha case until after the legal recess from August to September. I protested strongly. I pointed out that it was impossible for rrife to undertake such a task, and I begged thatthe Rochette case shuold be allowed to take its normal course. The Premier adhered to his order, and asked me to report to him. I was indignant. I was certain that it was the friends of Rochette who had engineered this astounding coup. On Friday, March 24, Maitre Maurice Bernard called at the Public Prosecutor's office. He told me that, yielding to the representations of his friend the Minister of Finance, he was going to intimate that he was ill and to ask for the postponement of the Rochette case till after the -long recess. I replied that he was looking very well, but that it was not my business to discuss the personal health reasons he had urged, and that in the last resort I could only rely on the wisdom of tho President of the Court. He wrote to that Judge. The latter, whom I had not seen and did not want to see, replied by refusing to accede to the request. Maitre Maurice Bernard expressed great annoyance. . . . What was I to do? After a violent internal struggle, after a veritable crisis, of which my friend M. Bloch-Laroquc i (Deputy Attorney-General) was the sole witness, I decided, under pressure of the moral violence exercised upon me, to obey. I summoned M. Bidault De l'lsle (the Judge who had to try the case), I explained to him with emotion the doubts which afflicted me. Eventually M. Bidault De l'lsle consented, out of regard for me, to postpone the case. That very evening—i.e., Thursday, March 30—1 called upon the Premier. I told him what I had done. He seemed greatly pleased. In the waiting room I saw M. Dumesnil, manager of the ' Rappel,' a newspaper favorable to Rochette, which had frequently insulted me. .He had called, undoubtedly, to see if I had yielded. _ Never have I been subjected to such a humiliation, (Signed). Fabre. March 31, 1911. HOW MME CAILLAUX WAS TREATED AT ST. LAZARE. Mrnft Caillaux was treated at the St. Lazare Prison more as if she were a rich patient in a hospital than a person accused of murder. Her special privLeges were due to the fact that she has not yet been eon* victed. Her cell is large and airy. Tha wardresses, like those all through the prison, are nuns. Mme Caillaux was allowed a maid to dress her and to wait on her at table. She was not given the fare supplied to the hundreds Of other women prisoners at St. Lazare, but was allowed to send out to a restaurant in the Boulevard de Strasbourg. Furthermore, she wore her own clothes, instead of the coarse grey gowns with large white linen hoods which are the uniforms of convicted persons. It is not believed in Paris that a verdict of guilty will be brought in against the Finance Minister's wife,', and it is recalled that a previous case occurred in 1902, when Mme Paumier shot a member of the staff of the journal 'Lanterne' in mistake for M. Millerand, who was Iheu editor, in revenge for an article defaming her hvis-v band which had appeared in that paper.