SINGULAR MURDER PLOT.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 4079, 28 February 1894, Page 6

SINGULAR MURDER PLOT.

UNRAVELLING A MYSTERY.

A singular murder plot was recently unravelled at Surat, in India. At one of the gates of the city (once a rival to Bombay), on a dark night, two Parsis came up, bringing with them the nearly senseless body of a Hindoo whom they had found lying wounded and bleeding on the roadside, about a mile from the gate. The policeman on duty took the wounded man and the Parsis to the Foujdar or chief Native police officer of the city, to whom, when he had recovered a little strength, he told his story. He said he was a merchant of Bombay, and that he had started that morning by train from Bombay, with 500 rupees in cash, to make some purchases at a fair in Kattiawar, which he intended to reach by the ferry from a point about eighteen miles north of Surat. In the carriage with him were four persons whom he knew by sight, although he was not otherwise acquainted with them. In the course of conversation it appeared that these persons were also to leave the traiu at Surat, and that their destination was in the same direction as his. They offered to accompany him as far as the ferry, to which they said they knew a short road, and advised him to stay with them at a respectable lodging-house near the station till the cool of the evening, when they would all start together. Suspecting nothing, and trusting to the respectability of his friends, who were got up in proper style of Hindoo traders, the poor man fell into the trap, and no sooner had they cleared the city gate on their way to the ferry than the pretended merchants set on him, demanded his money, and one of them struck him with a knife in the chest, inflicting a terrible wound, from the effect of which he sank senseless, and was brought in, robbed and bleeding, by the first passers-by. COMMITTED FOR TRIAL. This was his story as told to the city Foujdar, who lost no time in informing the superintendent of police, and sent the wounded man to the hospital. The neighborhood was scoured by mounted police during the night, but no trace of the robbers was found, and it was evident that they had not gone on towards the ferry. News was sent to Bombay, where the police were more successful, and, on the indications given by the wounded man, three out of the four criminals were arrested and brought to Surat, where they were confronted witlTEheir victim, and at once identified, and kept in close arrest, notwithstanding their-pro-testations that they had not left Bombay, and knew nothing of the complainant, his, wounds, or his money. In the course of three weeks the wound was sufficiently healed to admit of his appearing before the magistrate, when a mass of evidence was forthcoming to confirm his statements. The keeper of the lodging-house was a friend of his, the policeman at the gate by which they left Surat, a potter at work near the roadside, a laborer returning from the fields, all contributed evidence of the most convincing nature, and the three culprits were duly committed to take their trial at the criminal sessions. CONVICTION OF THE ACCUSED. There are two ways of trying sessions cases in India. In some districts, where educated Natives are numerous, cases are tried by a jury, whose decision is final as to the guilt or innocence of the accused. In other districts the judge is assisted by three assessors, who are selected by lot from a list of the respectable inhabitants, and who deliver their opinion at the close of a trial as to the guilt of the accused. The judge is not, however, bound by the opinion of the assessors, but after receiving it he delivers his own judgment : and if he finds the accused guilty he passes sentence according to law. In the case in point, the assessors, notwithstanding the convincing evidence for the prosecution, and the breakdown of the alibi set up by one at least of the accused, unanimously declared that the accused were not guilty. On the judge fell the onus of a decision. With a sagacity that does him credit, as the sequel will show, the judge stated in his finding that the evidence was too good for him, that every link in the chain was so thoroughly completed as to fill him with suspicion, which the wound and the wound alone was able to remove. He could not get over the patent fact of this wound, the severity of which was so great that a European officer, not unaccustomed to such scenes, fainted at the sight of it. The accused were, therefore, convicted and sentenced to imprisonment for a term of years, and duly incarcerated in Surat Gaol, where we will leave them for a time. THE PRISONERS SET AT LIBERTY. In the spring of 1872 some prisoners were being tried before a judge of the High Court at Bombay for a conspiracy, when certain revelations were made by an approver which led to the judge addressing the Government of Bombay, and orders were issued for a thorough inquiry into the case tried at Surat some months before. These inquiries were made, and resulted in the three supposed criminals being set at liberty, a number of persons being tried for a detestable conspiracy. It was proved at the trial that the man who was wounded outside the gates of Surat belonged to a gang who were in the habit of letting out their services to gratify the vengeance or the hate of any individuals rich enough to hire them. This was effected, not by employing the stiletto of the assassin or the match of the incendiary, but by misdirecting the course of British law and British justice, and making it an awful instrument of wrong and injury. The four men who travelled with the wounded victim were fellow-members with him of the same gang, but dressed in the costume of those who were to be implicated in the pretended crime. The party left Surat after dusk, and when they reached a lonely place one of them submitted to be wounded in such a manner as to produce a terrible gash and a great flow of blood, without fatal consequences or permanent injury. The others then made the best of their way back to the railway station, and thence to Bombay. And some of the gang returned in a few days to Surat with a sum of money, by means of which the necessary witnesses, including at least two policemen, were suborned and prepared for the trial of the innocent victims whom the wounded accomplice had denounced. A FOUL CONSPIRACY. It appeared that the man who allowed himself to be wounded had died of fever some time before the discovery of his guilt, and one or two others of the conspirators had absconded and avoided arrest ; but with these few exceptions all the actors in this tragedy against whom the charges of conspiracy or perjury could be brought with reasonable hope of success were committed for trial before the High Court of Bombay, and it is satisfactory to know that all who were so committed have been convicted by a jury and sentenced to seven years' imprisonment. Native society in Bombay was thus freed from a dreadful scourge, as the gang was proved to have undertaken at least three other enterprises similar to the Surat one, and there was reason to suspect their connection with even a greater number of cases. CURIOUS FACTS ELICITED. The trial elicited some curious facts. The : person at whose instigation the Surat case ' was got up was a wealthy Hindoo merchant trading in Bombay, who had some spite against the three men who were imprisoned on false evidence. He seems to have known

of the existence of the gang, and to have found no difficulty in placing himself in communication with them, and, for 2,000 rupees paid down, the chiefs of the gang undertook to carry out his wishes. When it came to settling which of the gang was to be wounded, one of them offered to undertake this disagreeable role, receiving only the same share of the bribe as the rest, and not the quarter share to which he would otherwise, by the custom of the gang, have been eu titled, provided that he might be allowed to denounce a private enemy of his own, as well as the three persons indicated by the merchant. After some demur this was agreed to, and the wounded man accordingly laid his information as against four instead of three assassins. But when the three men were arrested in Bombay an intimation was given to the fourth man, the special object of the wounded man's jealousy, that trouble was in store for him I unless he renounced all claim to a certain lady, declared to be his wife, and gave her up to his rival lying wounded at Surat, along with a sum of money. PERJURY BY THE POLICE. It is still more terrible to contemplate the unquestionable readiness with which the police seem to have lent themselves to the purposes of the gang, and to purveying and providing evidence for them. It would be supposed that no person, with the sense of right and wrong, could view without abhorrence so detestable a conspiracy; but here we have the painful spectacle of experienced policemen of long and approved service, well paid and enjoying the full confidence of their European superiors, lending themselves for a miserable bribe to a scheme of dark crime, coming forward as witnesses, and urging others to do the same, misleading their superiors, aud allowing three innocent men to lie in gaol for many months. This case has exposed some dark and gloomy corners of Native life and society in India, and presents a true but sad picture of the task before us, of the evils to be eradicated, and of the tools we have to work with.