FRENCH AMAZON KILLS MAN

Southland Times, Issue 23394, 29 December 1937, Page 7

FRENCH AMAZON KILLS MAN

Quarrel At Barge On The Seine SEQUEL TO CHRISTMAS CELEBRATION (Received December 28, 6.30 p.m.) PARIS, December 27. Mme Violette Morris, aged 44, a racing motorist and a former discus and weight-lifting champion, who wears men’s clothing and has her hair Eton cropped, shot dead an unemployed mechanic, a former member of the Foreign Legion, who attempted to force his way on to the barge on which she lives with a woman friend on the Seine. Mme Morris figured in a test case in Paris in 1930, when she claimed damages from the French Women’s Sporting Federation for expulsion because she played tennis and other sports clad in trousers. The Court dismissed her suit on the ground that the wearing of trousers by women in the society of young girls was out of place and not to be encouraged. Mme Morris had dressed like a man for years on the ground that it was essential to her athletic activities. The victim of the shooting was Joseph Lecamps, who celebrated Christmas Day at a fashionable restaurant at Neuilly in the company of Mme Morris and the Baron and Baroness de Trobriand. They all separated good friends, but Lecamps next evening visited Mme Morris’s houseboat, moored in the Seine, and accused her of creating a misunderstanding between him and the baron and baroness.

Lecamps left, but returned and met his death.

Mme Morris declared that she shot him because he threatened to throw her overboard.