NOVEL LEGAL PROCEED INGS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 19933, 31 August 1927, Page 6

NOVEL LEGAL PROCEED INGS

TRAGEDY OF HIGH SEAS MURDER OR ATTEMPTED SUICIDE LONDON, Aug. .15. A man who stabbed two other mon, in one case with a fatal result, was placed in the dock at the Old Bailey but, owing to extraoirlinary circumstances, was charged only with atteinpter murder. He was Fritz Castus Frederickson, a Dane, aged 25, a galley boy on the British steamer King Bleddyn. Mr Eustace Fulton, who prosecuted, said that on a voyage between Las Palmas and Genoa, Jh-edericksen went into the engine room and attacked Benjamin Burgess, the third engineer, with a large cook’s knife. George Blagg, the dbnkeyman, rushed to the engineer’s assistance and was badly stabbed. The ship put back to Kas Palmas with the injured men. Blagg recovered in hospital, but Burgess died. Mr Justice Swift remarked that the charge of attempted murder was unusual in view of the death of Burgess. Mr Fulton: The reason he is not

charged with murder Is because that, although he was stabbed on an English ship, he died- on Spanish territory. The Judge: Have you ever before known of a man being tried for attempted murder when, in fact, the victim has died? Mr Fulton: It is not within my experience. The Judge: Suppose the Spanish authorities sought to extradite him for morderl Mr Fulton: They could, of course, apply for his extradition. The judge said he dad not think it rlesirablo to try the accused for attempted murder when some other country might desire to prosecute ‘him for murderThe trial then proceeded for the attempted murder of Blagg only. Sir Travers Humphreys (defending) submitted that Fredericksen was so ibrunk at. the time that he did not know what he was doing. A medical witness stated that Frederickson was in such a physical condition that he would be likely to run amok after taking an excessive quantity of alcohol. Fredericksen was found not guilty of attempted murder, but guilty of wounding with intent to do grievous bodily harm, and was sentenced to seven years’ penal servitude.