SHOOTING IN PARK

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19043, 17 June 1936, Page 5

SHOOTING IN PARK

“INFURIATED HUSBAND”

COUNSEL’S SUGGESTIONS

MELBOURNE, June 16

The Royal Commission of inquiry into the shooting of Police Superintendent J. O. Brophy in Royal Park on the night of May 22 was continued to-day. Detective-Sergeant 11. O’Keefe, resuming his evidence, said that after seeing Mrs. Madeline Orr he realised that the shooting was not accidental. The witness made no attempt to question the car driver, William Maher, nor Mrs. Elsie Phillips. He was convinced' from what Mrs. Orr told him that a crime had been committed.

The Royal Commissioner, Mr. Justice Maclndoe, asked Mr. Wilbur Ham where his cross-examination was leading and Mr. Ham (who is appearing for the Herald and the Sun) replied': “It is very necessary to find out whether police officers- had some motive for falsifying the reports handed to the press.

Tho Judge: Your suggestion to dale is that Superintendent Brophy may have been shot by an infuriated' husband. DEEMED INDISCREET

Mr. Ham : That’s what we are here for. Superintendent Brophy was in circumstances which could be regarded as indiscreet. Therefore, he had something to hide and gave a false account ol the manner in which lie received his injuries, while anybody with ordinary intelligence would suspect his account was false. His colleagues shared that suspicion and the senior detectives lent themselves to the falsification of the facts.

Frederick Millard, of West Coburg, gave evidence lie was stopped on tile way homo in his- car and wast asked 1 to drive Superintendent Brophy to a hospital. Superintendent Brophy told him that he had been shot at Royal Park. The witness was under the impression that the shooting was accidental': Dr. Stanley O’Louglilin, of St. Vincent’s Hospital, said that Superintendent Brophy was his patient on the night ol the shooting. Superintendent Brophy told him that lie had been shot and the witness gained the impression that it occurred while he was on duty. Next day Superintendent Brophy asked the witness to keep all pressmen away.. PREPARING OFFICIAL VIEW

Dr. O’Loughlin added that Sir Thomas Blarney, the Police Commissioner, also asked him to keep the press away from Superintendent Brophy as he wanted to prepare an official statement for release to tile press. Dr. A. Carroll, medical superintendent at St. Vincent’s Hospital, said that. Superintendent Brophy told him within a quarter of an hour of his admission that he (Superintendent Brophy) received a telephone message to investigate a case m Reynolds Park. He went there with a friend. Two masked men fired at him.

Douglas Gillison, a reporter on the Argus, when shown a slip of paper relating to Superintendent Brophy’s case, declared that it certainly was not the one placed before the reporters by Detective Sloan. He and other reporters asked whether detectives were engaged on the affair, to which Sir Tnomas Blarney replied: “What can we do? The men were masked and a torch was flashed in Superintendent Brophy’s face.” Sir Thomas Blarney said that he did not know where the ’first press statement about Superintendent Brophy had originated. The inquiry was adjourned.