AMAZING STORY TOLD BY ROBERT McMAHON

Stratford Evening Post, Volume I, Issue 74, 6 March 1931, Page 6

AMAZING STORY TOLD BY ROBERT McMAHON

SEIT FREE, BUT AFTERWARDS SHADOWED BY SYDNEY POLICE, HE CLAIMS—NOW SEEKS JUSTICE IN SYDNEY

SYDNEY, Feb. 24. An amazing story of how for several days he has been hiding in a Melbourne suburb because he was suspicious of police watching his'every move, was told by Robert James McMahon, who, after ; establishing an alibi concerning the Mena Griffiths murder, with which he was charged, was re- . leased from gaol. McMahon looked dapper and wellgroomed when he arrived in Sydney yesterday by the Melbourne express, having been presented with a secondclass ticket by the Crown Law Department of Victoria.' "I want to say at the outset," McMahon remarked, "that I am extremely grateful to the Sydney press for the just and helpful publicity it gave to my case. lam none the less grateful to the people of Leeton, who enabled me to prove my absolute innocence of the vile crime with which I was falsely charged. "When I reached Melbourne with two detectives, a big crowd was gathered at Spencer Street station, and I took the opportunity of trying to indicate to them that I was not the man the police were justified in arresting. "As' I left the train I took off my hat and deliberately shook my head, and I gathered, from several remarks I heard from the crowd, that I was understood. "I repeated the action when I was faced by the crowd at Russell Street Police Station. "The purpose of my visit to j Sydney," said McMahon, in the 'presence of his solicitor, Mr. P. N. Roach, "Is to take immediate steps to secure compensation for the dreadful ordeal tq which, I have been submitted through the mistakes of the police. "I have naturally been forced to spend a great deal of money, and, apart from that, my family and relatives and friends have been gravely worried by all that has transpired in the last few months.

"I am convinced that, in the interest of the public, my case should be thoroughly investigated. "When I was released from gaol," McMahon went on, "I had good reason to suspect that every move I made would be watched every move I made would be watched by the police. So I decided to seek solitude for a few days, and repaired to one of the suburbs of Melbourne, where I stayed, unknown and unobserved. "I was so suspicious of the police watching me that I refrained from even writing to my brothers in Sydney and, although I knew tbey were anxious about me, I thought it better to ,do wliat I did. "The Crown Law Department had previously issued me a ticket to Sydney, but, when I presented it at the railway on Tuesday, I found that it had. to be.re-dated, and that necessitated my returning to the department, which accommodated me with nothing more than the ticket. "I think the public is entitled to know that, from the outset of the case, I persistently declared that there were at Leeton witnesses who could prove that I was there the day the murder was committed.

"But all the time the police charged me with telling lies, and some of them denied that I had made the declaration, which, if probed, would have immediately cleared me of all suspicion. McMahon will remain in Sydney, and in the meantime arrangements are being made to hnve his case investigated.