A SORDID STORY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25101, 17 December 1942, Page 6

A SORDID STORY

EVIDENCE AT INQUEST (P.A.) WELLINGTON, Dec. 16. “ The evidence discloses a rather sordid story. This woman was old enough and had responsibilities enough to know better than to choose to go on an expedition with a young serviceman, said the coroner, Mr W. G. Mellish, at the inquest into the death of Ivy Muriel Stewart, who, on the night of December 9, fell five storeys'from a fire escape in Lloyd’s Hotel in Cuba street. It appeared, the coroner said, that the woman was endeavouring to escape from the hotel by the same means by which she entered it. She was evidently in a highly intoxicated condition. She walked about 20 feet along the platform of the fire escape, which was cut away to allow access to the ladder in the dark, and in her intoxicated condition she probably failed to realise there was a gap and stepped into space, falling five storeys to •the ground. There was no evidence that she had any injuries other than' those suffered in the fall. The verdict was that death was caused by fractures of the pelvic bones and multiple internal injuries, resulting, from a fall. Evidence was given that when the landlady went to the room occupied by an American serviceman, Mrs Stewart went through the window on to the fire escape. The landlady earlier in the evening had prevented her from going upstairs in the hotel. Mrs Stewart had two children, her ( husband being in the armed forces over- I seas.