Accused To Stand Trial On Levin Murder Charge

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27397, 9 July 1954, Page 12

Accused To Stand Trial On Levin Murder Charge

PALMERSTON NORTH, July 8. Rejecting submissions by counsel for the defence, Mr R. Hardie Boys, of Wellington, that the Court should dismiss the charge, Mr L. M. Inglis, S.M., in the Magistrate’s Court at Levin this afternoon, committed William James Meehan to the Supreme Court for trial on a charge of murder.

Meehan, a 32-year-old carpenter, of Levin, was charged with the murder of Louis Magnus Yorston, a linesman, aged 24, at Levin on June 20. Mr Boys submitted there was no evidence before the Court on which Meehan could be committed for trial on the charge of murder, and the evidence by no means excluded the accused’s own statement of what had happened. The only question a jury would be required to decide was whether Meehan had been guilty of manslaughter. In evidence, Dr. E. T. G. Miller said he was called to 11 Stuckey street, and in a bach at the rear of the house he found Yorston’s body lying in the doorway. A blood-stained carving knife was in his right hand. In the presence of the police the body was turned over, and he had found a 2jin wound in the chest. To Mr Boys, the witness said he could give no accurate opinion as to the time of death.

Dr. T. H. Pullan, pathologist at the Palmerston North Public Hospital, said he had made a post-mortem examination and had found an oblique wound in the left of the chest, 2£in long. The heart had been completely penetrated by a single stab wound, and death was a result of a massive hemorrhage caused by this. Considerable force would have been required to cause the wound he saw. It was his opinion that it could not have been caused accidentally, such as by falling on a knife. Events After Party

Mrs Ursula Jean Petrie, an exchange attendant, and occupant of the bach, said she met the accused in Australia in 1952. She returned to New Zealand with him in that year, and occupied the bach in October last year. The accused boarded with the owner of the house in front of the bach.

On the night of June 20 she went with the accused, Yorston, his brother, and two others to a party at Ohau. No-one was affected by liquor consumed during the evening. The accused, the witness, Yorston and his brother returned to the bach for supper shortly before 11 o’clock She had noticed no ill-feeling between members of the party. She used a knife to cut bread for the meal and put it on the bench. She identified the knife as the one produced. . The witness said that Yorston’s brother suggested that he and Yorston go home, and the accused offered to drive them. Yorston said he was “not going home yet.” The witness said that she sat in the car. and then the accused came running out and told her they would have to get a doctor as there had been an accident. They both drove off in the car and got Dr. Miller. They then picked up Yorston’s father. When they reached the bach she remained in the car. Brother’s Evidence Gene Allan Yorston, aged 25, the dead man’s brother, said there was little association between his brother and Mrs Petrie. While he and the accused were talking they noticed his brother and Mrs Petrie had left. They Went out to look for them, and the witness saw his brother and Mrs Petrie standing by the car. They moved off up the street as he and the accused approached them. When he and the accused caught up with them the accused and his brother came to blows. The accused and Mrs Petrie then returned to the bach, and be suggested to his brother that it was time to go home. The witness then went home, but did not know where his brother had gone. He added that his brother was lefthanded. Cross-examined by Mr Boys, the witness said he learned of the tragedy after he got home, but that was not until an hour after the accused and Mrs Petrie had picked up his father/ He had noticed no marks on either the accused’s or his brother’s faces. He had “ticked his brother off,’’ he said. After the blows were exchanged in the street he left and went back to Ohau.

The father of the dead man, Alfred Allan Yorston, a clerk, of Levin, said that about 1.15 a.m. on June 20, accused called at his home. He went with the accused to the bach in Stuckey street. The accused seemed very agitated. He told the witness that Louis had run amuck and there had been an accident. He said Louis had got a knife from somewhere and had fallen on it. Mrs Petrie, who was also in the car and was in an agitated condition, had threatened to throw herself in the Ohau river.

“On arrival at the bach I found my son lying face downwards on the floor,” continued the witness. “I noticed a knife in his right hand. The fingers were slightly curled, and the knife was just lying on the palm.” The witness telephoned Dr. Miller. His son, he said, was naturally left-handed. The right hand had been badly crushed while working with the Navy during the wharf strike.

Sergeant William Grainger, of Levin, said that when he went to Stuckey street Yorston’s body was lying face downwards, with the left arm underneath. The right arm was lying alongside, with the palm upwards. The fingers were curved and a knife was lying on the palm. He thought a stain on. a curtain produced was caused • by blood when Yorston fell and struck the curtain, said Sergeant Grainger. Yorston’s left hand was perfectly clean, but there was a smear of blood on the back of the right hand. He noticed blood on the toe of Yorston’s right shoe. It appeared to have dropped down on to the shoe. Statement by Accused

The witness produced a statement made by the accused, in which he said that he, Mrs Petrie and the two Yorston brothers had returned to Mrs Petrie’s bach about midnight from a party at Ohau. After supper Allan Yorston was trying to persuade Louis to go home, but Louis did not want to go.

(New Zealand Press Association)

Allan left to walk home, and the accused told Jean (Mrs Petrie) to go out to the car. The accused then endeavoured to get Louis to leave, but Louis replied that he had as much right in the bach as the accused. “There had been no abuse by either of us at that stage,” the statement said. “I was standing with, my back to the stove, and Louis grabbed a butcher’s knife from the bench and stood back in the entrance between the kitchen and the bedroom. He appeared to have a sarcastic look and sneer. He held the knife in his right hand, with the blade forward and with his right hand raised up to his right shoulder. “Louis came for me with the knife in the same position. Up to that time I thought he was fooling, but then I decided that he was serious when I saw that look. As he came at me I went down in a crouching position at his ankles, and he touched me with his body as he passed me and fell. I then heard a sort of groan and a little squeal. I got up, and Louis was lying face downward in the bach doorway. I saw blood in two places, at his mouth and by his right side. I felt his head with the back of my hand, and he did not move or answer me. I did not see where the knife was at the time.” In his statement the accused said he had met Louis Yorston only two or three times previously. When they arrived back from the Ohau party they all stood together on the footpath. Louis said that he liked Jean and was going to have her. The accused told Yorston he was not going to have Jean.

“Louis then hit me with his fist below the right eye and caused the mark I have now,” the statement continued. “I put up my hands to stop Louis hitting me, but I did not hit him back. He had a cut on the bridge of his nose, which he washed when we reached the bach. Ido not know how he received the tut on the nose.” To Mr Boys the witness said the accused had always conducted himself very well and had no reputation for physical violence. Second Statement Read

Detective-Sergeant J. H. Alty, of Palmerston North, said he did not consider the accused’s first statement about the incident in the bach to be consistent with the bloodstains on the curtains, on the mat, and on the dead man’s clothing. He gave the accused an opportunity of making a further explanation, and the accused said: “I plead self-defence.” Asked whether he had been holding the knife when Yorston was wounded, the accused replied that everything was confused from the time Yorston picked up the knife. The witness produced and read a second statement allegedly made by the accused. In this he said that he did not know what had happened after he and Yorston had started to struggle. The next he clearly remembered was that Yorston collapsed on the floor and the accused himself was holding the knife. “When he collapsed on the floor, I realised that the boy had been hurt, but I did not realise how seriously,” the statement said. “I wish to correct this. While we were struggling, we both fell, and I got up. He did not get up, and it was then that I realised that I was holding the knife and that Louis was hurt. . . . His right hand was out from under his body with the palm up, and I dropped the knife into it. I did not deliberately place it into his hand.

“When I was interviewed by the police, I was somewhat bewildered and thought that people might take a wrong impression of what had actually taken place, and that is why I did not explairxto them just what actually did happen. I thought that if I did give a full explanation it would make things appear more sordid than they really were. “I did not at any time have any intention of hurting Louis, and the fact that he did get stabbed was completely accidental.”