DOUBLE TRAGEDY.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVII, Issue 18220, 7 October 1919, Page 6

DOUBLE TRAGEDY.

DIVORCED HUSBAND’S DESPERATE ACT. SHOOTS CONSTABLE AND COMMITS SUICIDE. [Pee Press Association.] WELLINGTON, October 6. To-night a man named Alexander Aspin, a waterside worker, tried to enter the premises in Brook Street occupied by his former wife, who divorced him about a year ago. Tho woman escaped, and a neighbour summoned Constable Dudding. When the com stable arrived at the house he looked through tho kitchen window, when a shot was fired from within and the constable fell, the bullet going through his right eyo. Aspin then Bet fire to tho house. A posse of police and the firo brigade reached the scene shortly after, and then a second shot was heard. Tho house was entered, and Aspin was found in. a dying condition with a Colt revolver Iving alongside him. The brigade extinguished the firo, and Aspin and Constable Dudding were removed to the hospital, where they both died.

Constable Dudding was a young married man with no children, and he hailed from the Auckland district. Aspin, who wa9 forty-eight years of age, and a Norwegian, attempted to commit suicide about twelve months ago.