A Shocking Story.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume I, Issue 49, 4 October 1887, Page 3

A Shocking Story.

The Parisian William Sikes must be given the palm over his Whitechapel colleague in crime for cold-blooded ferocity and unmitigated barbarity. The London rough would no doubt do a murder cheap enough, but it is hardly profitable that even in the moments when he was most “ down on his luck ” he would go as far as to slay Nancy for the miserable sum of a penny. Yet this was the price paid to a miserable logon named Marellin by one of his companions in ruffianism for having thrown a drunken woman into the Seine, where she was drowned. The facts of the horrible case are these ; A few months ago the dead body of a young woman was fished up out of that part of the river between the Point Saint-Michel and the Morgue. She was identified as a street-girl named Levot, aged twenty-nine years, and known in the nefarious neighbourhood of the Place Maubert as “La Bretonne.” The police came to the conclusion that the woman had been thrown in, and they were right, for, thanks to the astuteness of M. Clement, a commissaire or inspector charged with criminal investigations, who is worthy ot the best of the Rue Jerusalem, the murderer was traced to his lair. It appears that a short time ago a man named Decouard was arrested, with five others, for a robbery committed in the Central Markets. In examining the prisoners, M. Clement discovered that Decouard bad been the so called protector of the unfortunate woman styled “ La Bretonne.” Taking the bull by the horns, M. Clement at owe charged the robber with her murder. Uecouard turned pale, became embrnssed, and £ua.lly told the officer what he knewb He said that <- few hours before the murder he had been with “ La Bretonne ” and several << corner boys ” of his own class in a low house of entertainment, the name of which was the “ Cafe of Damp Feet.” It was one of those fellows who committed the murder, but M. Clement only found him last week at Montreuil. This Marcelin had left the Cafe des Pieds Humides with his companions, when he suddenly offered to bet a champoreau— or cup of coffee and brandy, worth two sous—that he would throw " La Bretonne ” into the Seine. The bet was accepted, and Marcelin walked towards the woman, who was leaning drunk against the St. Michel Bridge. The night was dark and rainy, and the Bridge was deserted save by the band of rascals who watched the proceedings of their copain with diabolical interest. Marcelin seized the girl as if to embrace her, and then, lifting her in his arms, flung her into the dark flowing river. The splash caused the night watchman and two policemen to run towards the spot, but they did not see the band of ruffians. The body was found two hours afterwards. Marcelin, when he and his friends were at a safe distance from the scene of the murder, coolly claimed his wager, and, after having swallowed his cup of poisonous champoreau with consummate relish, he actually went back with his friends to see the body of the woman, Bending over the corpse was a friend of the deceased, who kissed her; but as she was engaged in doing so, Marcelin struck her on the head, and hissed in her ear that he would “ give her a cold water bath” too, if she did not keep her tongue quiet. All the band are now in the hands of the police.