Long Police Service Ends

Manawatu Times, Volume 62, Issue 236, 5 October 1937, Page 3

Long Police Service Ends

RETIREMENT OF MR. J. BROPHY MELBOURNE, Sept. 23. One of the most notable crime investigators in the history of the Victorian Police Force, Mr. John O’Connell Brophy, retired this week. Ho has been on six months * sick leave prior to retirement, and this period has now expired. But he marked the date of his retirement by a farewell visit to the colleagues with whom he was most closely associated as chief of the Criminal Investigation Branch/ Mr. Brophy gave 37 years of outstanding service to the force. For 26 years he was a detective, and was one of only three detectives who have become chief of the Criminal Investigation Branch. Broad-shouldered and portly, he gathered a host of friends by his geniality. Last year Mr. Brohpy was the central figure in a mysterious shooting affray at night in Royal Park, about a mile from the centre of Melbourne. A Royal Commission inquired into the circumstances of the case, but the identity of the assailant who wounded Mr. Brophy has not been established. Mr. Bropby and Mr. F. J. Piggott, another brilliant detective, were associated in numerous memorable cdses, and in some circles it is claimed that the partnership between these two was the most notable and successful in the history of criminal investigation in Australia. Their outstanding achievement was the conviction of Colin Ross for the murder of Alma Tirtschke in the Gun Alley crime in 1921, for which Ross was hanged.