LIBYAN POST DRAMA

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 108, 31 January 1935, Page 9

LIBYAN POST DRAMA

Murder Trial in France SENTENCE ON ACCUSED Tunis, January 29. A desert drama of illicit love, jealousy, and violence was revealed at the trial of Lieutenant Cabanes, a handsome Drench officer, charged with murdering Colonel Caillon at an outpost in Tunis on the Libyan frontier in 1933. The defence declared that Caillon organised a Sahara expedition of seven officers and four women to provide him with the opportunity of pursuing Madame Perrin, wife of an army doctor. Cabanes, passionately in ■ love with Madame Caillon, who resented her husband’s-infidelity and frequently reproached him, finally shot the colonel dead after a quarrel One of the judges declared that Caillon, although a fine soldier, seemed to consider officers’ wives mere love dolls. The party lived- in an atmos-: phere of illicit love' and blood. Addressing Cabanes, the judge said: “You shoot with remarkable accuracy. The first bullet hit the colonel’s heart.” Cabanes remorsefully denied a trooper’s allegations that he shot Caillon in cold blood. He declared that lie respected Caillon. who respected him, but he was overcome by the circumstances. Counsel for the defence recalled Madame Caillou’s words after the shooting: “It was a gesture of folly, hut I should have done likewise, if I were a soldier.” Cabanes was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment. The judge denounced the scandalous conduct in a threeroomed hut at a frontier post, where the whole party slept the night of the killing. The evidence showed that Caillon ejected his wife from their room, vdic-reupon she and Madame Perrin fought, scratching and biting. Later Cabanes and Caillon quarrelled fiercely. Cabanes got his revolver from' his car, returned, found Madame Caillon unconscious, shot Caillon throe times, anil then attempted suicidexbut was prevented by the other officers. The widow, who was absent at the trial, is suing Cabanes for damages in order to defend Caillou’s memory.