SHOT FIRED BY CONSTABLE

New Zealand Herald, Volume 78, Issue 24101, 21 October 1941, Page 6

SHOT FIRED BY CONSTABLE

GRAHAM GRAVELY WOUNDED END OF LONG MAN-HUNT

[by telegraph—special reporter] HOKITIKA, Monday The long man-hunt for the Koiterangi farmer Stanley Graham, wanted for shooting dead four police officers and two members of the Home Guard, ended to-night. Caught by surprise, Graham was shot by Constable J. D A. Quirke, of Auckland, and fell, gravely wounded. It is doubtful if he will recover. Graham's capture took place on the lower slopes of Mount Doughboy about three miles at the back of his own homestead. Dusk was closing in as he made his way down a creek-bed unaware of three ambushers, one of whom was Constable Quirke. A shot fired at close range rang out and Graham fell. The bullet passed through his body and came out the other side. It was found that he had previously been wounded twice. In spite of these wounds he had kept going.

The shootings began at Graham s home on the afternoon of Wednesday, October 8, when Sergeant W. Cooper, Constable F. W. Jordan and Constable P. C. Tulloch, all of Hokitika, were killed instantly, and Constable E.. M. Best, of Mainieri, received a wound from which he died three days later. Mr. C. R. Ridley, who went to the assistance of the police, was also seriously wounded and is still in the Hokitika Hospital. Two more men were fatally shot when Graham returned to his home in darkness the following night. They were Mr. R. J. M. Coulson and Mir. G. Hutchison, Home Guardsmen, who had joined the police in an endeavour to apprehend Graham.