MURDER IN SOHO.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 30 April 1937, Page 7

MURDER IN SOHO.

SENSATIONAL TRIAL OPENS AT PARIS. MAN AND A WOMAN ON TRIAL. [By Telegraph-Press Assn.-Copyright) PARIS, April 28. The most sensational of the many murders recorded in London's most cosmopolitan area, Soho, is beiny investigated at the Assize Court here in the trial of Roger Vernon, alias Charles Laeroix, aged 36, charged with murdering Max Kassel, otherwise "Red Max," and of Suzanne Bertron, aged 25, who is charged as an accomplice. In accordance with the usual French procedure, live minutes was allowed the photographers before- the Judge took his seat, in that period the accused being '-snarjped" while an artist mads a rapid sketch.

Then there was a duel between the Judge and Vernon in which the Judge reviewed Vernon's life and forced answers to most damaging questions.

After being reminded of his escape from Devil's Island Vernon described how he had repeatedly asked Kassel to return a loan of £25. Eventually Max came to Vernon's flat in Soho. "Max arrived furious," he said. "I knew immediately that he or I must be killed. He tried to strangle me and tried to seize my pistol, and it emptied itself by itself." The Court adjourned.

The bullet-riddled body of Max Eassel was found under a hedge outside St. Albans on January 24, 1936. Sir Bernard Spilsbury stated at the inquest that there were six bullet wounds and other injuries on the face and head consistent with blows received during a light. Though it had rained during the night, the clothing on the corpse was completely dry. The police believed that the victim, accompanied by a man and a woman, called at a roadside cafe at midnight on January 23. Ivassel, w r ho was known as Emil Alard, represented himself to be a FrenchCanadian. He was said to have arrived in England in 1933 and to be an itinerant jewellery dealer. London newspapers later declared that Kassel's death exposed him as the leader of an international gang of white slave traffickers and speculated on the crirao as the outcome of a gang feud. Later Charles Laeroix (also known as Vernon) and a woman known as Mrs. Naylor, but believed to be a Suzanne Eertron, were detained by the French police, the woman saying that Kassel came to her flat id London and that she heard shots and, opening a door, saw him go bleeding into the bathroom.

The British Government ■ made u formal request for the extradition, of the pair, the man on the charge of murdering Kassel, and the woman as being an accessory to the crime. The Note asked that if, on account of tJieir French nationality and on account of the law, the French Government was unable to accede to this request, steps should be taken to see that justice was done. It was stated that a French law of 1927, while making it impossible to extradite French citizens, enabled the French Courts to deal with crimes committed by nationals abroad.