TRAGEDY AT PERTH.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 11140, 2 December 1907, Page 5

TRAGEDY AT PERTH.

MURDER OF A WOMAN. ; MURDERER CONFESSES AFTER DECEIVING POLICE. (Press Assn. — By Telegraph— Copyright). (Received December 2, 9.15 a.m.) PERTH, December 2. A shocking tra'gedy, perpetrated a week ago, has been brought to light. The vie. tim i« a woman named Clark, who had been living with a gardener named Moore at Belmont Park. Moore has confessed to the crimed arid the manner in which he disposed of the body by burying it .six feet deep under the /kitchen. :<So complete had it been done that but for subsequent actions the crime might, never have been sheeted home , to him. „ The couple quarrelled frequently, and the story told by the neighbors was that the Avomaii had cleared \out. : On tho night of the murder a Ayoman heard her cvy out, "Oh, Jack ! : Oh, Jack!" The neighbors subsequently had their suspicions aroused, arid inform^ ed the police. The latter! examined the kitchen, and prodded the soft earth of the floor Avith a stick Avhich Moore sharpened for them for the purpose. Moore accounted for boxes of the woman's apparel in the room by stating that they were left,. by his previous housekeeper, Mrs Pearson, Avhbse whereabouts wili also be investigated. , _The search with ; the pointed stick revealed nothing because it Avas only three feet long. • . ■ " On a second visit by Inspector Connell he found Moore restive and unable to sleep, his stretcher being: over' the soft earth floor on the spot Avhere the body Avas subsequently found. . When confronted by the inspector, Moore confessed to the riiu'rder, and said ''We had a row. " I- was sitting on a box reading apaper, when she came in and said good-bye. A few seconds afterivards she calne back into the room with an axe which had been hidden for some time previously. She hiude a swipe at me. I ducked" and missed the blow, and then jumped up and punclied her. Then I grabbed her by the throat, strangled her, and the^e she is. She is down there,", pointing to the floor; He had burned boots and clothing and buried the . body naked with lime. The body was exhumed in a shocking state.