GRUESOME DEATH.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20420, 23 November 1929, Page 2 (Supplement)

GRUESOME DEATH.

FATAL PUBLICITY PLOT

SUFFOCATION BY GA£

INTERRED BY OWN REQUEST. There was a sensational solution lately of the horrible death of the notorious French swindler, the "Marquis do Champauberfwho was buried alive in a wood near Versailles with n pipe to admit air to his eotliii. The Paris police have established that, the amazing affair was Maged bv the criminal himself to obtain publicity for his forthcoming memoirs, lint the " stunt" miscarried, with terrible consequences to its originator. The solution of what was' at first regarded as a ghastly crime came as the result of a lengthy interrogation at police headquarters recently of three of the. friends of the " Marquis." who was known in criminal records as Clement Pussal The three men were Ory valet. who first told the police that he had leceived an anonymous letter stating that his friend had been buried alive, and took I lie detectives to the spot where the body was found; Baehelet, a grocer, who went to the (iare Saint Luznre to claim Pascal's belongings which had been left in the cloakroom there, and a man named Onrot, who accompanied llachelet, on that occasion.

The following explanation of the amazing affair was issued by Ihe Paris police soon afterwardsFrom the statements of witnesses it is clear that, it was Passal who staged the whole afiair in order to attract public attention to himself in order that lit*, might then be able to publish sensational memoirs.

The letters written to the newspaper Le Matin, which have been taken possession of by the police, have been "found to bo written on paper similar to that used by Passal in letters sent to his mother. It has also been discovered that Passal purchased a second-hand typewriter, and the peculiar characteristics of tho type on that machine lead to the conclusion that it was used both by Passal and tlii> " Knights of Themis."

The police subsequently arrested Durot and a man named Henri Boulogne, nicknamed " The Tattocd." a former convict. Both men arc slated to have confessed thai the whole affair was a put-up job and that the " Knights of Themis" wero figments of imagination. They are alleged to have admitted that they interred the "Marquis" on Tuesday afternoon at his own request and remained beside him far into the night, communicating to him through the tube and occasionally passing water through to him bv wav of refreshment.

The tragic ending to the adventure was presumably due to the fact that there was only one air tube in the coflin and that the absence of a through draught allowed carbonic acid gas to remain at the bottom of the colfin, where Passal died in agony from suffocation. A letter from Passal to his mother, dated from " P." on Sunday morning, September 22. bade, her farewell before he was " being buried alive."

The coilin containing Passal's body was found 111 a wood at, Verneuil sur Seine, near Saint Germaine.

Anonymous loiters, signed by " Tlio K of 'I beniis," wliicli wore sent, lo the Paris Matin, stated that, Uie Knights were a secret organisation formed to punish swindlers who had been too leniently dealt with owing to the weakness of Freiu-h judicial methods. It was suggested that the burial of Passal was an act of vengeance by (he organisation. Themis,, in Greek mythology, was tho personification of Divine justice.