VERDICT OF MURDER

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19803, 19 May 1934, Page 17

VERDICT OF MURDER

FINDING OF CORONER’S COURT. United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright (Received May 18, 10.15 p.m.) SYDNEY, May 18. At the inquiry to-day at Wagga into the death of Moncrieff Anderson, the Coroner returned a verdict that Anderson was murdered and committed the widow Mrs Anderson for trial on a charge of murder. The police produced evidence that Mrs Anderson, unknown to her late husband, had carried on correspondence with Edward Morey, who was recently sentenced to death for the murder of Percy Smith. Letters also were written by Morey from gaol to the accused woman. A message published on May 12 stated that Moncrieff Anderson, aged 33, a Crown witness in the trial of Edward Henry Morey, on a charge of murdering Percy Smith, was shot in the head at Wagga. The bullet presumably lodged in the brain. Anderson was with his wife and child drawing water from a horse trough in a lane, when the shot was fired from the cover of a large tree. His wife was later arrested and charged with murder. The crime for which Edward Morey was sentenced to death concerned the finding of the body of an unknown man in the Murrumbidgee River, five miles west of Wagga on December 26. The head was terribly injured, and a chaff bag was thrown over the head. The body apparently had been in the river for some time. On January 3 the body was identified as that of Percy Smith, a shearer, who was believed to be a native of Carlton, Victoria.