BRAVE NURSE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23220, 18 June 1937, Page 11

BRAVE NURSE

FIGHT WITH BURGLAR MAN ENTERS BEDROOM VIOLENT ATTACK RESISTED To a man whom he regarded as " a danger to society," Mr Justice Charles addressed serious remarks when dealing with a recent case at Liverpool Assizes which revealed a nurse's terrifying experience in her bedroom. The judge told the man, Alfred Jones, aged 31, painter of Daulby street, Liverpool: " If it had not been for medical evidence I should have sent you to prison for penal servitude for five years. "As it is, I shall commit you to Calterstone Mental Institution, and I desire that your case should be specially reviewed, because you appear to be a danger to society and ought not to be abroad. " I am very desirous that you should not be turned loose on the public again." Jones pleaded guilty to burglary at the nurses' home at Wh'ston Infirmary and causing bodily harm to Miss Caroline Hampson, aged 23, a probationer nurse, at p\e infirmary. " COURAGEOUS RESISTANCE " On February 23, stated Mr Allister Hamilton, prosecuting, Jones was convicted at Liverpool Police Court of loitering, and was sentenced to

one day's imprisonment, meaning his immediate release. He at once went to Whiston and broke into the nurses' home by means of a ground floor window. ' He first ransacked the bedroom of Sister Alice Mlaud Williams, stole a number of articles, and left the room in a state of disorder. He : then entered the bedroom of Miss I Hampson, who had been in bed for half an hour, but wa,s not asleep. | Hearing a movement in her room, and thinking it was another nurse, slie called out: " It's all right. Put on the light." She then felt the bedclothes I pulled off her, and found herself | engaged in a violent struggle with ■ Jones, against whose attack she | made a very courageous resistance. , The girl called out as loudly as ] she could for help, and managed to get away from Jones, but when she turned on the light she found he ! was bolting the door against her escape. | He told her if she screamed he would cut her throat. I , After a ten-minutes' struggle, Miss Hampson switched on the light and I was trying to get out of the room ; when Jones struck her in the :e. J BLOW WITH WATER BOTTLE Eventually the girl, in a desperate ' effort to subdue her assailant,

knocked him over the head with a stone hot-water bottle.

An alarm was raised, and another nurse found the girl in a distressed condition, bleeding from the mouth and suffering from shock. Jones escaped from the nurse's room, but was later arrested.

Detective Inspector Sullivan declared Jones' character was bad—in fact, nothing was known in his favour.

He has previous convictions, and had an obsession for stealing women's under garments. Dr Snell, medical officer at Walton Prison, gave evidence that in his opinion Jones was feebleminded.

' A representative of the Lan- | eashire Mental Hospitals Board re- : marked that if Jones were sent to 1 an institution, his case would be reviewed at the end of 12 months, and he could then be '<ept there or disi charged, at the discretion of the i visiting magistrates. j Mr Justice Charles: The trouble ! is that I am parting company with any control I have.

He then ordered Jones to sent to the mental home.