SOLDIER SHOT

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 174, 25 July 1942, Page 4

SOLDIER SHOT

COMRADE FOR TRIAL ACCIDENT WITH RIFLE (0.C.) SYDNEY, July 22. A jury could decide whether to accept a militiaman's explanation of the shooting of another militiaman, the coroner (Mr. Oram) said. He committed. Gunner Keith Robert Walton, 18, for trial on August 31, on a charge of having murdered Gunner Raymond Alexander Carey. "The uncontradicted evidence before me is that Walton used the words, 'I'll put a shot into you,' " Mr. Oram said. "Although I feel sure this young man did not intend to shoot his mate, there is a prima facie case of felonious homicide." Carey was shot at an Australian battery on June 27, and died on June 30. Gunner Theophilus Stephen Taylor said he was in the gun shelter when Walton said to Carey: "Why aren't you in the gun floor? If you don't get off to the gun floor I will put one in you." Taylor said Carey put a coin on the rail of his bunk and said: "Here's two bob. Cover it and have your shot." Taylor said he heard a shot, the bullet whizzed past him, and he saw Walton's rifle smoking. The muzzle was pointing towards Carey. Walton called out: "Carey! Carey! Carey!" but Carey did not speak after the shot.

Lieutenant Robert Henry Richards said that soon after he was notified of the shooting Walton, excited and almost hysterical, telephoned him. Walton told him: "I shot him, sir. I was cleaning the rifle and it went off."