TEACHER SHOT

Hokitika Guardian, 28 September 1928, Page 6

TEACHER SHOT

MYSTERIOUS CRIME.

IN LITTLE N.S.AV. TOWN

SYDNEY, September 20

Mystery, still surrounds the shooting of John Mulholland', a school teacher at Wolumla, near Rega, on the far south coast of New South 4\ ales, last Friday night. He was shot as he struck a match to light his pipe after he had left a friend’s place opposite bis own bouse near the school. Detectives have gone to the town liom Sydney, hut have made no arrest yet. The crime b ; ea.rs all the elements of mystery and the person who fired the sliot has not left a single'trace of his presence. Mulholland was ft well-respected member of the community and had been teaching at the school there foi a number of years. He was very popular and one time when the Department of Education proposed moving him to another town residents signed a petition asking the Department to let him stay there. They did so and Mulholland has established his position in the town, in the public life of which lie was a prominent figure. On Friday night last he was visiting some friends who live opposite, and had just lett their grounds and stopped for a few minutes to light his pipe. The lighted match must have made a target for the person who fired the shot for Mulholland was found a few minutes later, dead, shot through the mouth. The affair caused a stiq through the town. Mulholland leaves a wife, and three children. He was on particularly affectionate terms with ms wife, and neighbours stated that they were a. very agreeable pair. Wolumla is only a small hamlet, with a population of about 70 or 100. and any clandestine love affairs or liasons would be known to nearly everybody in the town. Detectives from . Sydney, however, have failed to unearth, so far, any suspicion of any such affairs. They have questioned many of the young women of the town, but though Mulholland was friend of a great many, he had always treated them with respect and had never made niuv-advances towards them, they said. Nevertheless, police declare that the detectives are working on a line of inquiry which is promised to provide a sensation when it is finally unearthed. No trace of the weapon which fired the shot has been found, nor have the police as yet announced the motive for the shooting of' Mulholland. They hint, however, that hate and jealousy from a man was the moving spirit which, actuated the person who fired a shot. Tt is considered possible that the murderer may have mistaken Mulholland for another person and that in the meagre light of the match, thought he was firing at someone else. ■The township is seething with excitement and theories are being advanced by all sorts of amateur crime, investigators. Tlie Sydney detective; has bad a great difficulty in silting tlie stories of people who have come forward to give evidence as most of tlieii stories are merely lie re say and liimoui. Newspapers are begining to take an interest in the crime and several have sent special representatives to the spot. The crime has assumed big proportions which are increased as the clays go on and no solution is reached.