Mrs Dean's Dying Statement.

Feilding Star, Volume XVII, Issue 45, 21 August 1895, Page 3

Mrs Dean's Dying Statement.

HER TREATMENT OF CHILDREN (Per Press Association). Wellington. August 20. Tbe statement left by Mrs Dean, auc fortvarded fco tlie Government, occupies fifty closely-written pages of foolscap It is ungrammatical, and contains manj faults of spclliug. A portion of it is of a quasi-religious character, and the wntei then goes on to detail her movements bj rail. The whole point of her argument is that she always gave the children laudunum when travelling, as crying infants were such an annoyance. She gave a child several doses at various times, but merely for tlie purpose of keeping it quiet, aud when it died she was so frightened that she buried it, and invented the story about plauting bulbs to avert suspicion. She says " I know I was the cause of the child Carter's death -that I had given her au overdose of laudunum— but with no intention of causing her death, aud God knows I r have beeu punished for my negligence, but a hair of baby Hornsby's head I never touched. The baby was not ten minutes alive in my caro altogether." Further on she says that a drug was given to cause sleep, uot death. The rest of the statement is devoted to minute details of various children committed tober care— some of them several years ago— and alive now. There is frequent reference to names and initials. It would be impossible to follow her in these details under several columns. Mrs Dean desired the statement to be published, ancl tho proceeds to be given to her husband, after deducting A's for Mrs Taylor, a widow.