BLACK HAND GANG

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22988, 16 March 1938, Page 10

BLACK HAND GANG

VENDETTA AMONG ITALIANS DILIGENT POLICE INQUIRIES [FROM OCR owx correspondent] SYDNEY, March 12 Inquiries into a number of murders which suggested the existence of a Black Hand society among Italians of the North Queensland sugar-cane fields have moved with dramatic suddenness to Sydney. A Brisbane detective has been here for several days following clues which may solve the mystery surrounding at least two canefields crimes; or which may result in preventing the murder of another Italian. The police have established a definite link between two of the murders, and have been able to prove' that both crimes were the result of a vendetta commenced in Calabria, South Italy. On January 14, this year, Vincenzo d'Astino, employed at an Ingham bakery, was fatally injured by a bomb which exploded outside his bedroom. A little more than 12 months before Francesco Feinino, an Italian canefields worker, was shot dead by a mysterious stranger who fired two shots from a double-barrelled gun, calmly reloaded, and again-#fired at the already dead man. Those two crimes were connected. One friend of the two'men still lives, and he has been told that at the end of the 12 months period which usually elapses between the Black Hand type of murders, his turn may come. He has fied to another State, on police advice. Detective-Inspector Brannelly, sent to Ingham to investigate the murder, was able to prove conclusively that a Calabrian feud was responsible for the crimes. The story of that-feud is an amazing one; but it may never publicly be told. • "f The Queensland Police Commissioner, Mr. Carroll, is determined to rid the north of the Black Hand terrorists. Inspector Brannelly has already travelled hundreds of miles in his relentless hunt for the murderers. He gathered information which resulted m Mr. Carroll sending him to Sydney, where two detectives were following certain clues. It became necessary to interrogate every Calabrian resident in Sydney. By some cxcocdihglv clever detective work, the police, the authorities believe, traced all but one.

Inspector Brannellv's trip was not in vain. He secured some valuable information relating to Calabrian feuds and returned to Brisbane. "The Queensland commissioner will not let thu matter drop," he said. The two murders referred to followed the killing with a bomb of Mrs. Bachiella in 19:34. and the sliootinji. of Domenico Scarcella in 1935, so that at approximately yearly intervals for four years an Italian has been murdered.