MURDER CHARGE.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LII, Issue 118, 19 April 1932, Page 8

MURDER CHARGE.

Per Press Association

HOivITIKA, April IS. William John Thomas Whalley, a married man, aged 33, was arrested today and charged this afternoon with having murdered William Edward Wogan at the Hermitage on November 5, 1931. Whalley was brought before a Justice of the Peace and remanded to appear at Timaru on April 26.

On the evening of November 5 last, William Edward Wogan, barman-porter, was found dead in his bedroom at the Mount Cook Hermitage, with a .22 calibro rifle bullet in his head. On February 29 last the Coroner returned the following verdict: “That William Edward Wogan died bn November 5. 1931, at tho Hermitage, Mount Cook, from laceration of tho brain substance and haemorrhage, tho result of a bullet wound fired from a .22 rifle. The facts so far proved in my opinion definitely exclude the conclusion that deceased committed suicide. They also are, in my opinion, inconsistent with deceased having accidentally shot himself. The matter is now one for the police to take such action as they may bo advised, and tho inquest may legally be reopened if the occasion warrants this course.”