REJECTED LOVER'S CRIME.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 231, 29 September 1928, Page 3 (Supplement)

REJECTED LOVER'S CRIME.

"MY LOVE IS MY RUIN."

YOUNG WOMAN MURDERED.

"My love is my ruin. I am insane •with love of her," wrote a young man a few hours before he killed the girl whose affections showed signs of waning. With such remarkable composure that it seemed that he did not realise the terrible nature of his crime, he heard the death sentence passed on him at Newcastle Assizes, and walked casually from the dock. Extraordinary letters were read when before Mr. Justice Hawke, Alfred Allison (20), chauffeur, of Gross Keys Lane, Low Fell, Gateshead, was fouud guilty of the murder of Gladys Isobella Jackson (20), at High Heaton, Newcastle.

Mr. G. H. B. Streatfield, who prosecuted, said the parents of the murdered girl were sitting in the kitchen when 6he staggered in with a wound in her throat from which she died in a few minutes.

On the same niglit Allison walked into the Central Police Station, and after inquiring for the girl, said, "I have done it." After having been cautioned he said: "I did it and threw the razor away. She said I was too good for her and I said I wasn't. That was one of the reasons I did it. It was a funny thing for her to say, wasn't it?" A letter was found on accused, who said he wrote it the night before the tragedy. The letter read: "I am insane with love for Gladys. Revenge is sweet. My love is my ruin. For ever I love ber. I love her with all ray heart. I worship her. I adore her. I am too poor for her. Glad and I will meet again in heaven or hell—the latter for me." On the reverse side of the page was written:—"Good-bye, mother. Ask Billy Elroyd why I did this. It is her reputation for breaking hearts. She won't break any more. Please don't worry. Love to all. It is best this way." On the envelope was written:—"Don't think bad of her. Put my ring on her finger. She loves me, but says she has led a rotten life and is not worthy of my love." Cooling Affections.

Allison and the girl had been attached to each other for some time, said counsel, and Allison remained attached to her to the end, but the girl appeared to be cooling off, and was endeavouring to avoid him. Allison's resentment, it was suggested, reached its climax prior to the tragedy owing to a rebuff he had received from her.

Other evidence was to the effect that during the latter part of the friendship the girl had tried to avoid Allison.

Frederick William Allison, father of the prisoner, said about three weeks before the tragedy the youth was worried and couM not eat his food. From his schooldays he had had a sort of St. Vitus' dance. He had never shown any affection for any other girl.

Mrs. May Winifred Allison, mother of accused, said that when her son got excited he used to shake a good deal, sometimes in his hands and sometimes in his feet. Three weeks before the tragedy he had a "drawn" look, and 6he thought hia old nervous trouble was returning.

Dr. Robert Stuart, medical officer of Durham Prison, said he had Allison under observation for seven weeks, and he had seen no symptoms of St. Vitus' dance.

The jury were absent twenty minutes, and returned a verdict of guilty, with a recommendation to mercy. Allison stood calmly to receive sentence, and scarcely seemed to appreciate liis position. The judge said that a change in a girl's affections towards a man did not justify murder. He added that he would forward the recommendation to mercy to the proper quarters.