TWO TRAGEDIES.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 644, 23 December 1932, Page 5

TWO TRAGEDIES.

Cases Baffle Sydney Detectives. BODIES FOUND IN PARK. (Special to the " Star.”) SYDNEY, December 16. ■ Last Sunday morning a boy walking : ! through Queen’s Park, Waverlev, the i | eastern extension of the great Cen--1 tennial Park, came upon the dead body - of a woman, and the police were at once informed. The corpse, almost entirely denuded i of clothing, was lying half concealed i under some bushes and the head had , been battered with some weapon The police took the finger prints of the | victim and by their help she was identified as May Miller, aged thirty, one of the “unfortunate ” class, convicted at ; various times since 1928 of offences ■ against the law. i The detectives searched the locality for stones that might have caused the wounds, or for other possible weapons. : but they found nothing of importance, except that fragments of bloodstained clothing were dicovered concealed in 1 some bushes a little way off. The C. 1.8. i officers then “rounded up “ a number of the hapless derelicts who, to the number of a or so. regularly haunt Centennial Park*and other parks, holding periodical drinking parties at which “ Hyde Park cocktails ” horrible mixtures—are the favourite beverages. Men and women of this type, maddened by meths., are capable of almost any crime, but so far the investigations of the police hav.e been 1 entirely without result. , There is at first sight a close resemblance between this horrible crime and the murder of Hilda White in Centennial Park a few months ago. The locality was much the same, both victims were denuded of clothing and hidden under bushes and there were other points of similarity which suggested | that the same sanguinary monster had j been at his work again. But the police I ! have now abandoned the theory that. ! ! Hilda White and May Miller were vie- | 1 tims of one and the same murderer. 1

In spite of energetic investigation no ! definite clue has been forthcoming An even worse case was reported on i Thursday. One of the unemployed : camped in National Park reported to the police that he had come upon the nude and battered body of a girl lying under some bushes near Loftus railway station about sixteen miles from the city. The police rushed a car to the spot and found the girl still alive. She was taken to St George's Hospital and the surgeons did what they could. But her skull had been fractured with heavy blows delivered apparently by a tyre lever or some such weapon, and though she seemed partially conscious she was ; unable to speak and died on Friday morning, without giving any indica- | tion of what had happened since she | left her home. She was identified as Bessie O’Con- I nor, aged 17. living in Redfern Her I people are poor but respectable—the word is odious but it conveys some meaning. The girl was a good swimmer, her brother is one of the State's champion diving team, and she had been swimming in races at Coogee after 6.30 on Wednesday evening. She came home a little after nine o’clock, left her wet costume, told her mother that she would be back shortly, and disappeared. How could this child—for she was nothing more—quiet, well-conducted and happy in her home, have met this evil fate? It is very improbable that she had knowingly involved herself in any vulgar and perilous escapade. But the police point out that she was seen leaving the Coogee baths alone after her swim on Wednesday evening and she was home at Redfern too soon to have come by tram. She must therefore have gone home in a car; but whose? Her' friends and relations scout the idea that she would have “ taken a lift ” in a casual way from a stranger. The driver must, therefore, have been an acquaintance, and it seems possible that she may have accepted an offer to drive home from Coogee, then, as the evening was warm, she may have been persuaded to prolong the excursion after leaving her costume at home and speaking to her mother. And so all unknowingly she drove away to this terrible death. So far neither the ingenuity of detectives nor the keen, instinct of the

black trackers whom they have called I to their aid ha s contributed much toward the solution of this tragic mysj tery. It is possible that there may be some remote connection between the death of the unfortunate May Miller and the awful fate of this innocent child. The murderer in each case may be the same man—another Moxley, or som« maniac crazed with thirst for blood. But so far. to all these questions then, is no reply—the parents and are stupefied with amazement a;** grief—the many thousands to whom the hapfess victim i s only an unknown girl, almost dumb with the horror of ! this tragic story.