INFANT MURDERS.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 1929, 11 December 1913, Page 7

INFANT MURDERS.

SENSATION IN' MELBOURNE, A WOMAN'S SUICIDE. TWO BODIES UNEARTHED. By Toicgraph-Prcsa Association-Copyright (Rec December 10, 7.20 p.m.) MoloGuma, December 10. Tnere has been a sensational development in connection with the mysterious disappearance of several babies adopted by a woman named Mrs. Newman, who committed suicide by taking poison at Mordialloc (17 miles out of Melbourne), alter the detectives had placed her under % arrest. The bodies of two infantß ffcro unearthed in a fowlhouse at the woman's residence, and at least four others are missing. Tlio woman, Tsho some years ago figured as the chanution woman runner of Australia, left a iioto stating that her husband and children knew nothing of the business. They thought that sho was receiving 10s. 'weekly for boarding children. Sho added that though the evidence was against her, sho was innocent.

It was recently reported by tho detectives in Melbourne that many iniant£are murdered in and around Melbourne every year, ami in not one case out of a hundred is tlio culprit discovered. Ko clue is ever left. The Last occasion, when a woman was arrested, after strangling and abandoning her child, was in ISOS. The fact that-the child had been vaccinated enabled tho detectives to trace the ; mother.

Mr. T. Smith, the secretary of the State Department for Neglected Children, in a report to the Government, said that the trafiie is indicated In- the fact that only 20 per cent, of the 'illegitimate children born in the State come under the notice of the Department; also by the frequency of advertisements in the newspapers. asking people to adopt cliildrcn. He adds that mothers and nurses have on many occasions admitted bavin? made arrangemciits for the Adoption of babies. Jn the opinion, of Mr. Smith, it should be made unlawful for a newspaper to publish any advertisement relating to the adoption or disposal of a child without the written permission of the secretary of the Department for Neglected Children. A detective, who investigated the matter, said, in his report:—"! am satisfied that private maternity homes offer peculiar faeilities for children to be secretly disposed of. and that not necessarily with the knowledge or connivance of the nurses who conduct the homes. Women come from the country, and rcsido at maternity homes under false names, and a few day* after the birth of their children they leave the homos with their babies. What in such a enso becomes of tlse mother and baby no one knows, and it is not surprising that many babies arc found murdered. When I -asked a nurse recently to tell mo what had become of .a certain woman, she replied, "God only knows. When she came she said that she 3i.ad no permanent home. When sho left I irave her a few shillings, and. so far as I know, she went into the street homeless."