THE RANGITIKEI MURDER.

New Zealand Herald, Volume I, Issue 249, 30 August 1864, Page 4

THE RANGITIKEI MURDER.

We learned by Saturday's mail that enquiries were being prosecuted in Turakina and elsewhere relative to the statement recently made by Wirihana. As yet we are not in possession of any official information as to the result —whether the ten natives mentioned by Wirihana have confirmed or contradicted his statement. Tho majority- of the settlers and natives in the district, are, however, strongly of opinion that it is utterly false. A reliable correspondent writes from Turakina on Thursday last: —" 1 wish to contradict that statement of AVirihnna, tho Maori, about poor Tricker. His (Wirihana's) father, Old llori (a very good native aiul well known by all the settler*- here to bo a truthful man,) told Mr. Charles

Cameron yesterday, that Wirihana* s statement-was false from beginning to end; and that at the timo mentioned, he (Wirihana) was with tho king nativea up the Wanganui river. The other natives here aU say the same. Is it, I ask, at all probable that Wirihana, at that timeja fugitive from justice, hiding to avoid the officers of the law, would bo working at a public road in Rangitikei ? Surely his statement bears with it the evidence of it) own falsity. As I write these lines old Hoii, W irihana's father, is by me, and l;e?ps repeatedly urging, that his son's statement, " is all lies." Two letters which Mr. Stock lately received from Mr. Hector McDonald have also been placed in our hands. The intelligence which they contain has been already partially made public, but we quote verbatim one of tho statements. On the 15th instant Mr. McDonald writes : —•' lam sorry that my son forgot to toll me what the Maori boy Hoani said to him when he went to see him about Wirihana. He met the boy Hoani going to snare pigeons. There were two more natives with him ; they were a little way from him when my son told him what Wirihana had said. He (Hoani)- called the two natives—they came back —ho said to them in Maori —"he korero tenei mo te pakeha i kohwiutia e mav (a) to te awhehaihe —(wo wero talkingabout the white man who was murdered by me and the half-caste.) I have written what he said to the natives'in Maori, as he spoke it before my son, The native names are Whehipeiliana and Kana." These statements should he accepted for what thev are worth. Till sifted thoroughly their value cannot properly bo estimated. But with so many loose rumours floating about, it appears singular that the authorities should not adopt a systematic course of enquiry which shall decide the fate of the man now lying under sentence of death.— Wellington Independent, August ".