ALLEGED MATRICIDE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19502, 4 December 1926, Page 11

ALLEGED MATRICIDE.

SON CHARGED WITH CRIME. MYSTERY OF AN EDINBURGH FLAT Australian and N.Z. Cable Association. (Reed. 7.5 p.m.) , LONDON, Deo, 3. Eight months ago Mrs. Bertha Merrett i was found in her flat at Edinburgh wounded by a pistol shot. Sits died in hospital two weeks later. , , The deceased's son, John Donald Merrett, a youth of 18, has now been arrested and charged with her murder. Mrs. Merrett was 56 years of age. She and her son came to Edinburgh from a New Zealand farming district in order that the son might complete his education for the diplomatic service. Ho entered I Edinburgh University. ' Mrs. Merrett took a three months' lease | of, a flat in a fashionable quarter of Edinburgh, and a week after they had entered into possession the tragedy occurred. The son told the. police that he was seated beside tho dining room firo on March 17 last when he was startled by a revolver shot. Turning; he saw his mother, who had been writing at a bureau, fall on the floor bleeding from a wound in the ear. ' : The hospitaL doctors found a bullet embedded in Mrs. Merrott's nose. 1 She died without recovering consciousness. The hitherto accepted explanation of the tragedy was that while Mrs. Merrett was handling her son's pistol, which was kept in the bureau drawer, she accidentally shot herself. Detectives, however, unceasingly continued their investigations The son meanwhile began studying for. entry to Oxford University. Lately he had moved to Hughenden, in Buckinghamshire,, where ho was being coached by the vicar of the parish. >. . V/.'; ■ Here he was arrested, and when taken by the police to a motor-car was seen to be 'crying bitterly. He has been further charged with forg* nig his mother's signature to cheques to the value of £SOO. Merrett was popular in the village of Hughenden, and played Rugby for the Badminton Club. It is, understood" that he received an allowance from the Public Trustee.