SHOT THAT MISSED.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 16822, 21 August 1920, Page 3

SHOT THAT MISSED.

TRAM PASSENGER’S ACT. SHOOTING IN THE STREET. In a tram in William Street, Sydney, early on Thursday evening of last week (reports the Telegraph) a man drew an automatic pistol from his pocket, took aim, and deliberately fired a shot at two or three men who had jumped off the car. The bullet missed the men fired at. The man with the pistol, who was wearing the badge of a discharged New Zealand soldier, was sitting on the end seat on the left-hand side of the rear smoking compartment of a double car. Ho was wearing civilian clothes) and a rain coat. He appeared slightly excited, though his aim was deliberate. As the sound of the shot rang out the lady passengers seated In the double smoking compartment screamed and became panicky. One made as if to leap out of the car, which was travelling at a fast pace at the time.

The tram was stopped almost immediately, and the conductor, acting with commendable promptitude, moved quickly along the footboard of the hack car, and grabbed the man, pinning his arms to his side. The man struggled violently with the conductor, and the tw > half fell, half stepped, otf the car on to the roadway. Several passengers alighted, and went to the aid of the conductor. The man, realising that he was overpowered, raised his arm in the air and invited his captors to search him. The firearm was what they wanted. The women got out and remained on the other side of the tram. Several other following cars drew up, and, perforce, came to a halt. A crowd quicldy gathered. “Go for your life—search me if you want to,’’ said the man who had fired' the shot. “It was all over a row,” he explained. In a left-hand trousers pocket one of the civilian searchers located the pistol. One chamber was discharged. The passenger pocketed the pistol and disappeared. The New Zealander was quieted. He agreed to again. board the tram, but he wanted his pistol. “I want my revolver,” ho kept calling out, but the man who had found it had vanished. Eventually the tram moved on, leaving the man standing in the street. Apropos of the happening, a fashion-ably-dressed woman, accompanied by a male escort, was seen to board the rear of the tram in a rather frightened condition at the top of William Street. This was when the New Zealander got in. “No, I don’t want to get on this tram, dear,” she said, as she watched with a frightened expression the man who a few minutes later fired the shot. The tram moved off; two or throe men jumped out to the roadway; the New Zealander drew the revolver and fired at them; the girl and her escort cowered down in the tram, and as soon as it stopped jumped out and ran away in an opposite direction. William Street at the time held many pedestrians and motor cars. It was remarkable that the flying bullet hit nobody. Five minutes afterwards a policeman was seen running towards the spot where the disarmed man bad been left.