POISONING CASE

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXX, Issue 20165, 20 July 1935, Page 6

POISONING CASE

SERIOUS CHARGES PREFERRED By Telegraph—Press Association GREYMOUTH, July 18. A charge of murder, and two of attempted murder, will be laid in the Magistrate's Court at Groymouth on Monday, July 29, following police inquiries into the death of Margaret May Smith at Blackball after eating chocolates from a box sent through the post. The accused man will be charged with murdering Margaret May Smith, aged 22 years, at Blackball, on September 24 last year, and also with attempting to murder Ethel Bragg and Jean Clark on the same date. On the morning of September 24 the girls Clark and Bragg, both aged about 20, and residents of the mining township, received through the mall a box of chocolates of a well-known make addressed to them jointly, and containing a note signed “Jim.” Neither was aware of the identity of "Jim.” but, suspection an innocent gift or at the worst a practical joke, they opened the box. Miss Smith, who was employed in an adjoining shop in the main street of Blackball, was present when the box was opened, and by the merest chance was the only one to eat any quantity. Almost immediately afterwards she was taken violently ill, and although attended by the local doctor, she died within an hour. The nature of her death pointed to strychnine poisoning and the police were called in. The chocolates and the contents of the stomach were forwarded to an analyst. The chocolates were found to contain strychnine. The sender of the chocolates had taken particular pains to conceal his identity. A lack of motive was the first difficulty the police encountered. Detective-Sergeants T. E. Holmes, of Christchurch, and H. C. Knight, of Greymouth, were immediately assigned to the ease, and have not relaxed their efforts in the intervening period. The accused man, although not a native of the West Coast, is well known in various parts of the West Coast, and it is understood that at the time of the crime he was employed on the unemployed gold subsidy scheme in the Blackball district. Recently he has been in Otago. He will be brought from south of Dunedin for the trial.

Nearly 1000 statements have been obtained in all parts of New Zealand by the poliee engaged on the investigation. All this prospective evidence has been sifted and checked, and in all 60 witness, including many experts, have been subnoenaed for the lower court trial, which is expected to last at least a week. The magistrate will be Mr H. Morgan, S.M., who will also sit as coroner for the adjourned inquest, which will be taken simultaneously. The inquest was opened on September 25 last year, but after Robert Francis Smith, brother of Miss Smith, had given evidence of identification and of the nature of his sister’s death in the bakehouse of Dumpleton’s bakery, where she was employed, it was adjourned sine die on the application of the police.

Inspector Donald Cameron, of Greymouth, will conduct the prosecutian, and witnesses will be called from Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, and south of Dunedin, as well as many local witnesses.