THE COLCHESTER MURDER.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 11956, 1 February 1901, Page 3 (Supplement)

THE COLCHESTER MURDER.

■ WELLINGTON, January 17. Sergeant Frost, of the Colchester Police, and Mr Marsh, keeper of the Colchester Town Hall, arrived yesterday for the purpose of identifying "(if possible) the man Lillywhite, now in custody on suspicion that he is Blatcli, the person who is charged with the Colchester murder. When the case was called on in the Police Court to-day Sergeant Frost said, that he had known Blatch well, and had seen him nearly every day when he was at Colchester. Accused resembled Blatch very much, but witness could not positively say that he was Blatch. The more witness looked at him the more he was convinced that he was the suspected man. Later on in his examination he said that he had formed the opinion that accused was Blatch. In cross-examination he said he could not recognise the man's voice as like that of Blatch, and could not say that Blatch was •marked with smallpox, as accused was. Nor could he say that it was Blatch, but the more he looked at him the more convinced he was that he was the man wanted. Marsh said that he did not at first recognise the accused as Blatch, but since he had been in court he had formed the opinion that he was. In cross-examination he said that Blatch had a place worn in his teeth from holding a pipe, but he did not find the same peculiarity in accused. As neither of the witnesses had seen Blatch with a beard, accused consented to be shaved. The prisoner went into the box and gave a history of his life on the lines of what he has previously stated. He produced letters from America; a Crown grant for land in Tacoma that he occupied before the date of the murder, and a certificate of membership of the Painters' and 1 Decorators' Brotherhood, North America, He again denied he was the man who was wanted. During the luncheon adjournment Lillywhite was shaved, and the two English witnesses afterwards stated that, after seeing him without a beard and hearing him give evidence, they were prepared to say that the prisoner was Blatch. Mr Bell, for the Crown, stated that he would on the following day apply to the Deputy-Governor to have the warrant endorsed, arid during the day he would apply to the stipendiary magistrate for the prisoner's committal to the English officials. The proceedings were then adjourned till the following morning. , January 18. .The magistrate decided to extradite Lillywhite, who is accused of the Colchester murder, pointing out that it would be better for him to go Home and have his identity completely established than to be a marked man here, as he would be if released. . January 21. Mr Justice Edwards has granted the application of Mr Skerrett, counsel for the accused, for a rule nisi for the issue of a writ of habeas corpus in Lillywhite's case, the rule to be returnable at the first sitting in Banco after the long vacation, which terminates on the 31st inst.

January 25. Messrs Skerrett and Wyllie, solicitors foi' Lillywhite, who is in custody on suspicion of being Biatch, the man charged with the Colchester murder, have received letters from the Chief of Police at Tacoma, Washington (United States), enclosing statements from reputable citizens identifying the portrait of the prisoner sent to them as that of Lillywhite, who, they assert, was resident at Tacoma from 1883 to some time in 1894, when lie left for New Zealand. The letter from the Chief of Police states that a number of Tacoma citizens have identified photographs as being that of Lillywhite, whom they knew well as n painter and decorator. A statement is enclosed from F. C. Clarke, whom the Chief of Police warrants to be a reputable citizen, and who says Lillywhite was never beyond his reach from 1889 to July 1894, when he saw him off by the steamer to New Zealand. The murder occurral in December, 1893. The Chief of Police states that it would be easy to get affidavits of identification from a number of .'reputable citizens. A portrait of Lillywhite in the Trades Union group is also sent. Mr Skerrett says it has been conceded that- if the documents found in the accused man's possession were his property he could not possibly be Biatch. This question, ho claims, is now set at rest by the correspondence.