A SENSATIONAL TRIAL IN VIENNA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9064, 26 May 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)

A SENSATIONAL TRIAL IN VIENNA.

A sensational trial has been heard at the Vienna Criminal Court lately. The facts of the case are not devoid of interest to psychologists. In December last a commercial traveller named Alfred Frankenstein induced Julie Kunerth, a housemaid, to steal some diamonds from her mistress, replacing them by imitation stones. In January Frankenstein declared to his accomplice that the theft would probably be discovered during the Carnival, and that therefore it would be advisable to abstract all the jewellery, and to feign a robbery—for which purpose he would discharge* a revolver into the upper part of her arm. The girl consented, but when the appointed day came, Frankenstein, after having taken all the valuables upon which he could lay his hands, shot straight into tho woman's breast, and left her for dead in the room. She was found shortly afterwards lying in a pool of blood, and was considered the victim of a daring robbery. A|| series of accidents, however, soon revealed tho true stateof affairs, though the woman after her recovery tried hard to exculpate the man who had acted so treacherously towards her. Frankenstein has been sentenced to seven years' penal servitude. The jury found him not guilty on the major count of attempted murder. The unfortunate girl herself has been condemned to two and a half years' hard labour as an accomplice. It will bo remembered that Frankenstein shot her in order to make it appear that she had been wounded in resisting burglars. She consented to be shot in the arm, but ho fired at her breast.