A SINGULAR CASE.

Dunstan Times, Issue 1277, 20 August 1886, Page 3

A SINGULAR CASE.

An inquest was held at Lyttleton recently on body of Thomas Kelly, who was supposed to hj we died from injuries receive! while unloading ,a. coal bulk. The inquiry., pat a different complexion on the affair. The evidence was to the effect that he had fallen down the hold of a coal hulk, where he was working on Tuesday, August 3rd, but appeared none the worse for the falls. He appeared to be in good health, and continued working the remainder of the week. He was all right on Saturday morning, but, according to the evidence of a girl named Lilv Treleaven, when he went, home on Saturday afternoon his wife pushed him off the verandah down a flight of steps, a height of Bft. He fell backwards, but rose up and went round to the back of the house and nothing more was seen of him. The girl appeared very intelligent, and stuck to her own statement, hut no one else could be found who saw anything of the occurrence. On Sunday Dr Harrison was called in, and found deceased nnconcious. He had a few lucid intervals, but conldnot explain what had happened to him, and was suffering from injuries to the spine, from which he died. On Wednesday last the doctor made a post mortem examination, and fonnd a large brniso on tl e lower part of the spine, apparently five or six days old. He considered d"ath had resulted from concussion of the spine, and that if deceased had received such an injury on August 3rd, when he fell on the coal hulk, he could not have gone about Working as he did till Saturday last. Deceased’s eldest daughter said her father was in bed all Saturday, but this was contradicted by several witnesses. The jury returned a verdict of manslaughter against deceased’s wife (Catherine Kelly).