POLITICAL MURDER

Hokitika Guardian, 1 October 1929, Page 3

POLITICAL MURDER

GERMAN COURT TRIAL. 'United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright). . LONDON, September 29. “The Times’s” Berlin correspondent states: The trial of Lieutenant Eckennann, who ordered the execution of Beyer, believing him to be a French spy, and regarding his execution as legally justifiable, as he sought to avert "Beyer's attack on the Reich, lias been concluded.

“There were inadequate grounds for Lieut. Eckermann’s belief. Therefore he committed involuntary homicide, but this falls within the amnesty of 1928, remitting the sentences for acts done from political motives.”

Sucli was the remarkable verdict of the court, ending what was believed to be the last trial in connection with the Black Reichswehr, a former secret illegal reserve, which provided a long series of murder trials, in which its members were accused of killing their comrades if suspected of treachery.

Lieut. Eckermann was extradited from Gautemala in the year 1919, and was accused of murdering Beyer in 1923. .

The Court awarded costs against the State.

: ' The Gerihan Nationalist press ' rejoices- at the verdict, declaring that it proves \ that the so-called murders were due to a love of the Fatherland. The Republican newspapers express the opinion that it is not a legal judgment, but a- political move.