SCHOOLBOY WORRIED ABOUT EXAMINATION

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 7083, 4 December 1929, Page 5

SCHOOLBOY WORRIED ABOUT EXAMINATION

Shoots Himself

CONSULTED DOCTOR PRIOR TO SUICIDE

CHRISTCHURCH TRAGEDY.

Per Press Association.

’ CHRISTCHURH, Last Night.

The adjourned inquest on the doath of Keith Bennie Miller, aged 17, a pupil of tho Christchurch Boys’ High School, who was found dead in the school grounds on Saturday morning, was concluded this evening before Mr, E. C. Lovvey.

Dr, Edwin Douglas Pullon, who was named in a note found on Miller’s body, said the boy had called at his rooms the previous night. Miller was in a highly nervous condition, but otherwise his condition was satisfactory. Witness had a half-hour talk with him and thinking it advisable, he reassured tho boy about his studies and left him with a final exhortation not to press his studies. The boy said he had not been looking forward to coming, in caso the doctor found something serious. Tho boy had said ho was being comfortably cared for. Evidenco w-as given by tho police and other witnesses as to tho finding of tho body with a 22 calibre revolver, with one chamber fired, in tho dead boy’s hand. Tho police, it was stated, had been unable to trace tho revolver or to discover how it came into Miller’s possession.

The Coroner found that Miller had died from a revolver wound, self-inflict-ed, while suffering from a nervous breakdown.

At the earlier hearing it was stated that death probably took place on Friday night, as tho body, when found, showed that tho boy had been dead for some hours. He was found lying dead at the foot of the Old Boys’ Memorial Shrine in tho playing field of the school. Clutched in his hand was a revolver, with one chamber discharged. A message of three words, written on a scrap of paper, was left by the body. All that it said was; “See Dr. Pullon.’’

The headmaster, Mr. G. Lancaster, said that tho boy was of a nervous disposition and had been worrying about his examinations, Last year, he had suffered from an attack of scarlet fever and had been left in a nervous condition.

Miller’s father, Mr. J. Miller, was Registrar of the Supremo Court at Christchurch until tho end of last year, when he was elevated to the Magisterial Bench.. .