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Hokitika Guardian, 15 July 1931, Page 2

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MISSING GIRL’S FATE BODY FOUND AT KILBTRNIE. BURIED IN' SPOIL HEAP. WELLINGTON, July 13. After digging operations carried on for three days, a body, believed to be tfiat of Phyllis A'"' Symons, aged seventeen, who had been missing for more than a fortnight, was recovered yesterday, buried in spoil dumped from the new tunnel near Kilbirnie..

-The body was found at 2.45 p.m., lying - face down and covered with a sack at the central portion of the dump where the police seem to have be, n concentrating their attention. The actual discovery war made by Con-1 stable Tomlinson, Detective Bayliss joining him shortly afterward. Aided by Constable Holmes, they soon had the figure in view. Word was sent for Dr Lynch, pathologist at the Wellington Hospital, and a van. By this time : the news had begun to spread and with-. in the next hour a crowd estimated at between 630 aild 600 people gradually took up positions at various ferices to watch the proceedings. FULLY CLOTHED. The police party had, of course, suspended opera.ions and were gathered near the spot where the discovery was made, pending the arrival of Dr Lynch. After some time the pathologist arrived and a brief examination was made of the positron in which the girl was lying. The body, which was fully clothed, was taken on a carrier by four police down a small lane leading to ■Ruahine Street, where the van was waiting.

After the departure of the van certain measurements were made. Police photographs were taken th.s morning. The dump runs parallel w : th Ruahine Street. Portion of it is hillside reserve, planted in trees, and .stretches away to the south. Up above is the site of the new park under construction. Onlookers placed themselves at various points of vantage, both on the level of the park and down at the neighbouring fences. The procession to the van after Dr Lynch had made an examination was watched with morbid curiosity.

A great deal depends upon the result of the post-mortem examination. The police undoubtedly are considering the possibility of a murder charge, but it is made plain that conclusions should on no account be jumped to before the result of the posl-rnortem examination is knowm A BIG TASK; The reat'ch itself w?s begun an the ground of certain Information which reached the police and cannot he disclosed at the present stage. An ‘ examination of the dump was made by the police on Wednesday last when it was .seen that the task before them would be one of considerable magnitude considering that ten days’ dumping had taken place since the girl was understood to have been last seen. Authority for the search was granted by the Commissioner of Police (Mr Wohlmann) on Wednesday evening and a gang of about thirty-five or forty men wi'h a mechanical navvy were working under police direction the next day. The men concentrated upon those portions of the dump where, from various considerations, the police considered that the search would most likely end. On Friday and Saturday the gang was increased to eighty, but the work was hindered by the weather. Sub-Inspec-tor Ward, who had been in charge all along, had twenty-six police and a detective on the job early yesterday morning and at 2.45 p.m. the search came to an end, justifying the suspicions of the police.

GOOD PLACE FOR A BURIAL. “Although we did not know it, a drain which was dug on Thursday passed within a foot of the body,” SubInspector Ward said yesterday. “For two days we were within the same distance of .it, although we could not have reached it before because the bank would have fallen. Twelve feet of clay were taken off the top at that particular point and down to the actual position we had to go sixteen feet, faking it off in layers of about three feet at a time. We were getting down to the swamp bed and had only two ?eet more to go when one of the policemen touched with his spade what looked like a sack. No particular notice was taken, as in the course of, the operations we dug up scores nf sacks. Between the 26th of last month and Tuesday last, when the Public Works men were told to discontinue dumping,, between two and three thousand tons of spoil had been deposited in the vicinity. We shifted close on 2000 tons of spoil since the operations began. If anybody wanted to bury anything there they could not have chosen a better spot, because at the place where the discovery was made spoil was being filled in from several directions.”

CASK UNPARALLELED. Interviewed yesterday another police official said that the search and recovery of the body had unparalleled circumstances. The last occasion hate when anything of a similar nature was undertaken was during the investigations which culminated in the Newland “Baby-farming” ease. It, however, was more or less similar to other well-known cases as far as the dis-

covery of bodies which had been buried was concerned. In the present case where burial evidently took place in a spoil dump on Which matter was thereafter dumped daily, the circumstances were entirely new. Some praise could be heard yesterday afternoon of the manner in which the police had attacked the job, involving as.it did the turning over of an extremely large quantity of lookj and muddy spoil during three of the •wettest days this winter. POLICE BUSY. COLLECTING EVIDENCE. (By Telegraph—Per Press Association l WELLINGTON,, July 14.^ ' With the discovery of the body of. Phyllis Avis Symons, the Police Department has completed the first stage of what .appears to he one of the most sensational happenings in Wellington in recent years. A post mortem examination of the body has been made,, hut the result of this will not be made public until after the coroni.nl inquiry. No date has yet been fixed for the holding ol the inquiry. The Police Department is now collecting evidence, but until every source of information that might help in solving the mystery of the giN’fc death haS been tapped, no definite move will be inadei