CHALK PIT MURDER
TWO MENTO HANG VICTIM KIDNAPPED JEALOUSY AS MOTIVE ' LONDON, March 24. Thomas John Ley. a former New South Wales Minister of Justice, to-day at the Old Bailey was sentenced to death. He was charged with the murder of John Mcßain Mudie, whose body was found in a chalk pit on Woldingham Common, Surrey, on November 30. Lawrence John Smith, a joiner, who faced the same charge, was also sentenced to death. Evidence was given during the hearing that Smith and Ley had kidnapped Mudie who had died subsequently from strangulation. Ley was alleged to have paid Smith £2OO for his part in the plot against Mudie. The Crown alleged that Ley was almost insanely jealous over Mrs. Maggie Evelyn Brook, his mistress, and imagined that Mudie was her lover and was blackmailing her.
The jury returned the verdicts after a retirement of 55 minutes. Ley said: “I am not surprised at the verdict.” He accused the judge of a biased summing up and added: “I am perfectly innocent, as I said from the beginning. I regret very much at my time of life that I have suffered an injustice of this kind. It is totally unwarranted.”
Lord Chief Justice Goddard said he agreed with the verdict.
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Bibliographic details
Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22289, 26 March 1947, Page 5
Word Count
209CHALK PIT MURDER Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22289, 26 March 1947, Page 5
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