POISON FIEND KILLS PEOPLE IN NIMES.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17833, 29 April 1926, Page 15

POISON FIEND KILLS PEOPLE IN NIMES.

FRENCH COURT PASSES DEATH SENTENCE

By Telegraph.—rrcss Assn.—Copyright. Aus, and N.Z. Cable Association. PARIS, April 27. A sensational poisoning case is reported from Nimes. Antionette Sierri, a middle-aged nurse, was found guilty of poisoning .six persons and was sentensed to death. Public indignation was such that sixty gendarmes were necessary to control the crowd at the Palais de Justice. Sierri administered pyralion, which is used in viticulture to kill grubs and is heavily laden with arsenic. Her first victim was an elderly maiden lady with whom Sierri had no quarrel. The second with Sierri’s Italian husband. The third was her lover, who. she said, beat her. The evidence showed that Sierri danced round the man's body, but experts scouted the notion that the woman was insane. They said she had only lost her moral sense and seemed to delight in taking life. • lii no case was there any financial gain from the murders, two others poi-

soned being a couple from whom Sierri rented a room. Tho prosecution alleged that Sierri attempted to poison five others, all of whom were her patients. They have not yet recovered.