BLOOD TRAIL FOLLOWED

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19138, 6 October 1936, Page 5

BLOOD TRAIL FOLLOWED

SEARCH FOR INJURED MAN MIDNIGHT QUEST IN CITY (Per Press Association.) WELLINGTON, this day. With his clothiug saturated in blood and blood 00/.ing from bis shoes, a young man staggered up to a taxidriver in Bouleott street in the early hours of yesterday morning and demanded to be driven to his home. Such was his condition that the taxidriver refused to let him enter the vehicle.

Telling the driver to say nothing about the occurrence, the injured man disappeared, leaving a trail of bloodstained footsteps behind him. Later, at 1.45 a.m., William Cox, a taxidriver, reported to a constable whom he met on. the corner of John and Riddiford streets that he had seen a man lying on the footpath in Adelaide road close to Hall street. In the meantime, the Taranaki street police had been investigating the trail of blood-stained footsteps, and having traced them for a considerable distance, handed the inquiry over to the Mt. Cook police. . Investigating the. report of the taxidriver Cox a constable found James McLennan Duffy, of C Liverpool street, Miramar, lying in a pool of blood, having apparently walked about three miles before losing consciousness through loss of blood. Tie was able to stand up, but immediately collapsed and was taken in a taxi to the hospital. Later inquiries revealed that in the vicinity of Bouleott street or the Terrace, he fell somewhere near Plimmer’s Steps and broke a bottle in his hip pocket. He received a deep wound two inches long, which bled freely, and he had already lost a considerable amount of blood when he approached the taxi-driver in Bouleott street.

At the hospital, three stitches were inserted in the wound, but anenvards he was allowed to go home.