MURDER AND SUICIDE

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19512, 10 June 1933, Page 6

MURDER AND SUICIDE

VERDICT ON WANGANUI TRAGEDY. NO EVIDENCE OF PACT. By Telegraph—Press Association WANGANUI, June 9. “There is no evidence to show that Mrs Gordon was a consenting party,” said the Coroner, Mr S. M. Dixon, in delivering verdicts at Wanganui yesterday in respect to the deaths of Nellie Gordon and Joseph Nathaniel Gordon, which oceured under such tragic circumstances at the Metropolitan Hotel just after one o’clock on June 3rd. He found that the female deceased met her death as a result of wounds in her throat inflicted by her husband, and that the man died from wounds in his throat self-inflicted.

A notebook was produced in which appeared passages written in indelible pencil, purporting to have been signed by both deceased, as having agreed to die together. Evidence went to show however, that the writing was that of the husband.

Detective J. Walsh, who appeared for the police, was definitely of opinion that the writing was that of Gordon, and none of it of his wife. The Coroner said he was satisfied that the writing was all that of one person.

Evidence went to show that the woman had left her husband. She came to Wanganui on May 31st to stay with a married woman, who had previously resided in Patea, and with whom she had been very friendly. Deceased had made it clear to her friend that she was leaving her husband for a man named Stan Thompson. He was to take her to Australia. Deceased’s husband visited her at Wanganui, and according to the witness, with whom deceased was staying, he had become reconciled to a separation. It was shown that on June 3rd the husband and the man Thompson both came to Wanganui with the intention of going to the Wanganui-Taranaki Rugby match. They met on the Patea station, travelled in the same carriage, and were met by the woman at Wanganui. The trio went to the commercial room of the Metropolitan Hotel, where they all had drinks. Gordon, the husband, after getting drinks from the bar, told Thompson that the licensee wanted to see him. Thompson went out, leaving the man and his wife together. He had a drink with the licensee and conversed for some five or seven minutes. When he went back to the commercial room he found both Gordon and his wife on the floor. She was quite still and Gordon was gasping. In reply to the father of the deceased woman, the witness Thompson said that on two occasions the husband had expressed himself as reconciled to his wife leaving him, and going to Thompson.