ESCAPE FROM MENTAL HOSPITAL.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 17375, 24 July 1918, Page 4

ESCAPE FROM MENTAL HOSPITAL.

TWO PATIENTS AT LARGE. (Peb United Pbess Association.) AUCKLAND, July 23. Two men who w.ere convicted of murdo'% and who were inmates of the Mental Hospital at Avondale, escaped last night, and are still at large. They are Norman Edward Keals, who murdered his sister-in-law and her infant at Onewhero on February 8, 1915, and Toeta Kai Nuka, a Raratongan, who was convicted on March 6, 1917, of the murder of Kenneth Livingstone at Man gapehi on July 26, 1916. Both men were last seen by the attendants in the reading room of the mental hospital at 7.15 p.m. Shortly afterwards the door was found open and the men were missing. RAROTONGAN RECAPTURED. KEALS SURROUNDED. (Pee United Pbess Association) AUCKLAND, July 23. Toeta Kai _ Nuku was recaptured near Henderson this evening. Keals has taken refuge in a 40-acre patch of gorse, which has been surrounded by a party of police. The strength of the police, however, was not sufficient to warrant them in entering the. bush, and strong reinforcements are being sent out. It is expected that a capture will be effected tonight. Particulars of the capture of Ntiku. show that Mr Muir (the hospital farm manager), who was by himself, saw the two escapees crossing a road into some scrub. Riding up, he fired two shots into the air, calling on the men to surrender. Nuku at once threw up his hands, but Keals dashed on