NO ARREST MADE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23033, 10 May 1938, Page 10

NO ARREST MADE

HOUSE VISITED POLICE REMOVE ARTICLES EXHAUSTIVE INVESTIGATION [BT telegraph PRESS association] WELLINGTON, Monday Although no arrest has been made in the Picton suitcase murder, there is every reason to believe that the police inquiry has narrowed down in the last 24 hours. Extensive and painstaking inquiries were carried out all day by Wellington detectives under SubInspector J. Carroll. After several other avenues of information had been explored, a party of detectives from the central station went by car to 20 Hinau Street, Hataitai, where a complete investigation of the house and grounds was made. When the detectives left they took with them alarge number of articles, including a large mattress, a wooden box, a pail, some small rolls of carpet, a wooden chair, and a quantity of smaller articles. All of these are now at the detective office.

Asked to-night why the articles had been removed, the Commissioner of Police, Mr. D. J. Cummings, declined to give any information on the subject. Mr. Cummings said that a thorough search had been made at the Picton Wharf for the remaining portions of the body, and assuming that they were there, it was hoped that the wash of the Tamahine as she left the wharf would cause the remains to rise to the surface. Failing that, however, he had given orders for dragging to be undertaken without delay. Evidence of the exhaustive nature of the police inquiries in Wellington is provided by the fact that to-night a man who turned out to be a visitor from Auckland was interrogated by detectives. He had no difficulty in proving his identity, and it transpired that his resemblance to another person was the cause of his being questioned. It is understood that Mr. E. N. Armstrong's younger son William, who travelled to Picton to identify the clothing on the body, is to return to Wellington by the Tamahine to-morrow night.