ACCUSED OF WIFE MURDER

Evening Star, Issue 19803, 29 February 1928, Page 4

ACCUSED OF WIFE MURDER

THE OMEO SENSATION STATEMENT BY GRIGGS. Pres* Association—By Telegraph- Copyright MELBOURNE, February 28. The inquest on Mrs Griggs was resumed at Omeo. The husband is at S resent in custody on a charge of murering his wife. The evidence showed that the relations between Griggs and his wife were strained owing to his relations with another young woman. The wife went away for three months’ holiday, and the night she returned was taken sick after eating a meal prepared by her husband, who also supplied her with other food and gave her medicine which the doctor had prescribed: but she gradually grew worse, and died next day. The doctor gave a certificate of death from heart failure; but, owing to rumors, the body was exhumed, and found to contain a fatal quantity of arsenic, of which Griggs had a quantity in his possession when arrested. In a lengthy statement made to the police after ho was arrested, which was read in court, Griggs admitted the straiiied relations with his wifo over the woman named, and said that ho had been guilty of misconduct with her. He also admitted that he had promised to marry her when his wife got a separation. Griggs denied giving his wife poison. Mrs Griggs’s illness was accompanied by severe vomiting and other indications of poisoning, but these at the time were attributed to a recurrence of the seasickness from which she had suffered on the voyage home from Tasmania. On the Sunday of the fatal seizure Griggs conducted services at two local churches. In his statement he declared that if his wife died of poison she must have taken it herself.

A statement made to the police by the woman, aged twenty, who caused the trouble between tbc couple was read in court. She admitted frequent misconduct between her and Griggs at the parsonage and elsewhere. Griggs told her that his wife was coming back only to get her things; then they were going to get a separation. Then, when things were fixed up he would marry her. Medical evidence showed _ that more than a fatal dose or arsenic was found in Mrs Griggs’s intestines, and apparently she had more than one dose, the last one not long before death. The doctor who attended deceased in her fatal illness gave evidence that he had formed the opinion that the vomiting was duo to the_ rough trip from Tasmania. Under this belief he gave a certificate of death due to heart failure, following on exhaustion. When informed that his wife was dead Griggs asked for whisky, adding that her death had shaken him up a good deal.' The case is causing tremendous local interest.

[lt is claimed by tho police that Griggs’s married life had not been happy, due to his continued attentions to tlie daughter of a farmer in the Omeo district, whpse family were all members of tho church over which Griggs presided. Mrs Griggs had on occasions publicly alleged undue familiarity with n girl whose father lived at Tongio Gap. Griggs had purchased a cycle and sidecar in order to cover his large district, and the frequency with which the girl was tho passenger excited undesirable comment amongst his flock. In view of his wife’s actions, a section of the church congregation began to display hostility towards _ the young minister, for, on many occasions,Mrs Griggs had appeared in town in a state of acute distress, said to be due to her husband’s conduct. Once she was found lying, with her baby, on the bank of a creek, in an advanced state of hysteria. It was generally concluded that tho reason for Mrs Griggs’s hurried visit to her parents in Tasmaniaj which lasted for more than six months, was due mainly to the attitude her husband adopted with regard to the girl concerned. The hostility of certain members of the church reached a climax at the quarterly meeting of the Methodist circuit, held on the afternoon of the detective’s first visit to Omeo in connection with the case. Two of the most reputable men of the district, prominent churchmen, moved and seconded a motion that, on account of conduct unbecoming to the church, the Rev. Griggs be asked to resign. Although the girl’s father was present at the meeting, they accused Griggs of undue familiarity with her. It was at this stage that one of the most dramatic incidents of tho whole affair occurred, for tho father rose in strong support of Griggs, declaring that Griggs’s relations with his daughter were merely friendly. Griggs, he said, had done nothing unbecoming a clergyman of the church. It is claimed that, prior to the meeting, the man had demanded of Griggs an explanation, and the young man had denied that there was anything between himself and the girl. Nevertheless, subsequently hc_ is alleged to have admitted to Detective Mulfahey that the worst suspicions of tho congregation were true. However, these facts did not come out at the meeting, and the chairman (the Rev. Godbehear) ruled that, as no definite charge had been preferred against Griggs, further discussion was out of order. From that time on, however, Griggs held no services in the Omeo church. Subsequent to the exhumation and the examination of the body by the Government analyst, traces of poison having been discovered, Griggs was arrested on a charge of murder.]