SIX MURDERERS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXVI, Issue 143, 2 June 1936, Page 8

SIX MURDERERS

Sentences Reviewed in N.S.W. ONLY ONE TO BE HANGED SYDNEY, June 1. The Executive Council reviewed the cases of six men who had been condemned to death. It was decided that James Leighton Massey, aged 21, who shot and killed Norman Stead after attempting to rob a service station at Darlinghurst on February 10, should be hanged an June 15. Aubrey Potter, aged 22, who was convicted with Massey, for the Darlinghurst garage murder but did not shoot or carry arms had his sentenced commuted to imprisonment with hard labour for 15 years, James Earsman, aged 67, sentenced for the murder of John Hewett, aged 94, who was found battered to death in his hut at Gilbandra on January 19, had his sentence commuted to imprisonment for life with hard labour. In the following three cases the sentences were commuted to penal servitude for life: Lionel John Roberts, aged 17, who murdered Robert King, aged 22, a grazier, near Tamworth on February 14; Roy Malcolm Souter, aged 17, who shot Christopher Bolger, aged 22, a grazier, near Wagga, on December 30 and threw the body into a well; Percival Henry Thompson, aged 55, sentenced for the murder of his wife and mother-in-law at Paramatta on December 27. ;