WOUNDING OF INSPECTOR

Wairarapa Daily Times, 3 May 1937, Page 5

WOUNDING OF INSPECTOR

THE BROPHY AFFAIR. MURDER CHARGE WITHDRAWN. (Received Monday, 9.50 a.m.) MELBOURNE, This Day. Superintendent Brophy, Chief of the Criminal Investigation Branch of the Police Force, after examination by a Government Medical Board, has been declared medically unfit to # return to duty. Inspector Brophy has been ill for many months, and medical advice was that ho was unlikely to recover unless he could! rest. The Attorney-General recently entered a nolle prosequi in the case against Davies'. A Melbourne cable on 17th March stated: In connection with the shooting affair on 22nd May last year, Superintendent Brophy appeared in the City Court today and identified Geoffrey Davies, aged 32, as the man who shot him. Davies, who was charged with having wounded Superintendent Brophy with intent to murder, was committed for trial. A Melbourne cable received in May last year stated that Superintendent John O’Connell Brophy, who had begun duty as chief of the Victorian Criminal Investigation Branch a week previously, ■rias shot in the face and the right arm in some mysterious manner. The Police Department -was at first exceedingly reticent. A Police Press Bureau official declared that Mr Bropliy was accidentally shot in the right arm while handling his own pistol at police headquarters. Newspaper reporters, who were banned at the detective office, however, ascertained that Mr Brophy was shot by a hold-up gang who. mistook him for a prominent Melbourne bookmaker who habitually carries a large sum of money and resides in Parkville suburb. Subsequently an official police statement declared that Mr Brophy went to Royal Park to try and catch some car bandits who had been operating in that locality, and was himself held up by two armed men, who apparently recognised him, and fired three shots before Mr Brophy could manipulate his own revolver which, jammed. One bullet passed through Mr. Brophy’s lower jaw, just missing a vital artery, and emerged at the back of his neck. Another broke his right wrist, and a third was deflected from his heart by the buqkle of his braces. Brophy was accompanied by two women. The State Cabinet appointed a Royal Commission to inquire into the affair. Ministers were said to be dissatisfied with the conflicting stories attending Brophy’s injuries and the attitude of the Commissioner, Sir Thomas Blarney. The report of the Commission completely exenerated Brophy.