Body On Beach With Bullet Wound In Head

Chronicle (Levin), 19 September 1949, Page 5

Body On Beach With Bullet Wound In Head

AUCKLAND, Sept. 18. Tntensive inquiries by senior de'teotives followed the. discoverv of a man with a bullet wound in his head, on an isolated section of the beach north of Piha on Saturdav morning. The victim was later identified as JEAN VENOT, aged 45, a French engineer, who had been staving at a city private hotel for about seveu months. The body was found shortly after 8.30 a.m. by a weekend resident- of North Beach, who was walking along the stretch of beach about three-qnart-ers of a mile north of Lion Rock. It was lying face upwards on the sand below high water mark. When found the victini was fully clothed with an overeoat over his suit and a blood stained whit'e towel with holes in its, wrapped tightly around the face and head. When the towel "was removed it wa's seen there was a hullet wound extending from the right ear over the right eye. A photograph of a woman and some bank notes and silver were found in his pockets. _ The police pathologist, Dr. Doyle, lafer examined the bodv. No trace was found of a weapon but it mav have been buried in th'e s'and by the tide as it is considered the dead man had beeh lying on the beach Since We'dnesday oiThursday. The dead man is beiieved to have been a fonher French soldier and engineer from Saigon ahd Was taken prisoner by the Japanese during the war. As the rosUlt of bad treatment While a prisoner of war he was in a bad stafe of health. When released Venot had no regnlar einplovment but had given caBual lessons in French to a number oi stndents and Auckland l-esidents.