FIENDISH GRIMES.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 46, Issue 14140, 10 June 1920, Page 5

FIENDISH GRIMES.

SERIES OF MURDERS. Press Association—Electric Telegraph—Copyright. (Australian and N.Z. Cable Association.) LONDON, Wednesday. Percy Topliss has been definitely .identified.' ft is suggested that he was also the perpetrator- of three recent- untraced crimes—the murder of Nurse Shore in the Hastings train in January, the murder of Mr Hoare and his housekeeper near Truro, and the murder of Constable Kelly- at Actou. (Toplis shot a. taxi-driver whom? he had engaged at Andover, Hampshire, and then vanished in his victim’s car. The murderer was an army deserter, and was well educated. He was very plausible, and had long record' as a swindler. After his desertion he posed as am officer, and haunted the West End, where he Apparently found a. large number of victims, for he spent money freely, and worked his way into fashionable circles. He was run to earth and shot in a Cumberland village. For six weeks there had been a hue and cry for the murderer, during whielt'Topliss made several attempts to hold up motorists, and shot a policeman and a farmer in Banffshire. A policeman challenged Topliss, who whipped one a revolver, threatened the policeman, and escaped for the time being. A party 1 of police collected and surrounded' him*, so Topliss made a last stand, firing un-> til he was shot, dead*.}- d