KEEN OBSERVATION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27271, 23 December 1949, Page 6

KEEN OBSERVATION

DETECTIVES CLUE IN MURDER CASE NZPA Special Correspondent LONDON, Dec. 21. The keen observation of a Scotland Yard detective-inspector was responsible for the conviction of Daniel Raveji, a 23-year-old salesman, whose appeal against sentence of death for the murder of his father-in-law, Leopold Goodman, at Edgeware, London, on October 10. was dismissed by the Court of Criminal Appeal yesterday. Earlier, on the night of October 10, Raven, with his wife’s parents, visited Mrs Raven in a nursing home, where she had given birth to a boy on October 6. They then returned to Mr Goodman’s home in Ashcome Gardens, and Raven left after a few minutes to go to his own home a short distance away. Shortly afterwards, however, a relative discovered the battered and bleeding bodies of Mr and Mrs Goodman in their living room, and summoned the police. Raven was also summoned, and when he arrived he was interviewed by Inspector Diller. The inspector noted that Raven was wearing a freshly pressed suit and clean linen. This was unusual, as linen worn in London for even a single day usually shows signs of soiling. The inspector thereupon telephoned to the nursing home, and found that when Raven visited his wife only an hour or two earlier, he had been wearing a different suit and tie. • . . Inspector Diller then obtained Raven’s keys from him, and, going to his home, found a suit, partly burned, stuffed into a boiler stove. This clothing, on being dragged out of the stove, was found to be stained with blood, which was subsequently found to be of the same rare group as that of Mr and Mrs Goodman. At the trial Mr Justice Cassels specially commended Inspector Diller f9r his observation and promptitude in obtaining this important evidence.