MORRISON REPRIEVED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 14691, 27 May 1911, Page 2 (Supplement)

MORRISON REPRIEVED.

ESCAPES THE GALLOWS.

SOME UNSOLVED MYSTERIES.

After all, Stinie Morrison, the man who was condemned to death for tho murder of a Russian Jew namod Leon Baron, on Clapham Common, is not to dio on the gallows. Wo are informed that the Homo Secretary advised His Majesty to reprievo Morrison, and that his sen ten co has been commuted to one of penal servitude for lift!. Thus ends one of tho most amazing crime dramas of modern times. The murder, it will bo remombored, was committed on Clapham Common on the early morning of Sunday, January 1. Soon after daylight a policeman patrolling tho common came across the body of a man lying on his back, partly concealed by somo bushes. A coloured handkerchief covered his head, and when this was removed tho officer found that the man had been brutally done to death, his head having been battered with somo heavy, blunt instrument, whilst there was a knife wound in the breast. But most curious and mysterious of all, the facc had also been mutilated, tho murderer having carved on each cheek outlines of tho letter "S." At the time tho murder was discovered the Houndsditch outrages wero agitating the community, and it was at first thought that Boron had boon murdered bv a member of the gang of foreign criminals concerned in that awful affair, out of revenge for having given information to tho police, tho " S" being supposed to bo the first letter of the word "Spy." But from the first this theory was disregarded by the police, who had received no information whatever from Boron, who was a man living on a small incomo from some East End property. Boron, who lived in Jubilee-street, E., spent most of his time in Snelwar's Restaurant in Osborno-strect, and the inquiries made by tho police led them to look for a man who had for some weeks before the murder been frequently in his company, and spent several hours with him on The Night Preceding His Death. and whom they were told left the restaurant with him just before midnight on December 31, taking with him a long, thin brown paper parcel supposed to contain an iron bar, which, earlier in the evening, he had left in charge of tho waiter. Other witnesses also came forward to say that they had seen the two men togother in tho Whitechapel Road, and in the neighbourhood in the early hours of the morning. The man the police wero looking for answered the description of an ex-convict known to the authorities as Morris Stine, who, at the moment, was wanted under tho Prevention of Crimes Act, for being a ticket-of-leave man failing to notify his change of address. The official notice concerning Stcinc concluded with a warning, as follows :"This man is known to carry firearms, and may use them." It transpired that he had been living at a house in Newark-street, but ho could not bo found there, and,, in the hope that he would return, two detective officers took a room at a houso opposite, and waited. On Sunday, January 8, Steino turned up at Newark-street, was followed to a small Jewish restaurant in Fieldgate-street, and was there pounced upon by Detective-In-spector Wensley and three other armed officers. He was taken to Leman-stroet police station, and told that ho would be detained for failing to notify his address. Meanwhile, Detective-Inspector Ward, who had charge of the Clapham murder case, was sent for, but, according to the police evidence, before this officer arrived Morrison sent for Inspector Wensley, and said, "You have brought me here on a serious murder." This statement, given in evidence both at the Police Court and at the Old Bailey, produced a dramatic scene at the eleventh hour of the trial. Then a uniformed police-constable, named Greaves, came forward, and, on oath, flatly contradicted the evidence of the detectives that they had not said anything about' murder at that time. Police-con-stablo Greaves declared that one of them, who, ho belioved, was Sergeant Brogden, had told Morrison, soon after he was taken into the station, that he was to be charged with murder. As a result of this, the Home Secretary, after Morrison's trial had ended, appontcd a commission to inquire into the police evidence given at the trial. The report of the commissioner had been handed" to tho Home Secretary, but it has not yet been made public. When Inspector Ward arrived at Leman-street Policostation, Steinc, who had by this time given the name of Morrison, made a long statement emphatically denying that ho had any hand in Boron's death. The magisterial investigation was a very long one, and the trial at the Old Bailey created a record for duration, lasting nine days. Unsolved Mysteries in the Case. There are several mysterious points in the case which have never been cleared up. Boron's gold watch and chain, which wero missing when the body was found, have not been traced. The ownership of a coloured silk handkerchief, which shrouded tho dead man's face also remains unsolved. Nono of tho witnesses at the trial had ever seen it in tho possession of either the dead or the convicted man. There was also looming in tho background a mysterious second man. He, according to one of the cabmen who identified Morrison as having hailed him at Kennington Gate on the morning of the murder, ioined the roprievod man and drove away with him. Who that person was has not been found out.