MOTHER SHOT

Greymouth Evening Star, 3 December 1926, Page 5

MOTHER SHOT

YOUNG N. Z’ER. ARRESTED./ MURDER & FORGERY CHARGES. I (Australian & N.Z. Cable Assn.) • (By Cable —Press Assn.--Copyright.) LONDON, December 2. After a lapse of eight months, a New Zealander, John Donald Merrett, nineteen, was arrested on a charge of murdering his mother, Mrs Bertha Merrett, aged fifty-six.

Both came from a New Zealand station to complete the son’s education for the diplomatic service, and he .entered Edinburgh University. The mother took a three months’ lease of a mat, in a fashionable quarter of Edinburgh. A week after they entered into possession, the mother was found shot. " '

The son told the police that he was seated beside the dining room fire on March 17, when he was startled by a revolver shot, and, Jturning, he saw his mother, who was sitting at a buerau writing, fall on the floor, bleeding from a wound in the ear. . The doctors found a bullet embedded in the nose and the mother did not recover consciousness.

The tragedy, at first, was attributed to an accident, but detectives unceasingly continued their investigations.

The son, meanwhile, began studying for Oxford, and took up residence at Hugenden (Buckinghamshire), where he was arrested and further charged with forging cheques for £3OO.

He was popular in th\ village, and played Rugby for Badmiitgton. It is understood that he received' an allowance from tlie Public Trusted.