Locked Up for 25 Years.

Gisborne Times, Volume VI, Issue 187, 15 August 1901, Page 3

Locked Up for 25 Years.

CRAZED BY RATS AND VERMIN

Paris, June 8. The sensation of the week has been the arrest of Mme. Monnier, a rich, miserly land owner of the neighborhood of Poitiers, and her son, a former sub-prefect of the Department of Vienna, and a leader of Poitiers society, on the charge of incarcerating Mdle. Blanche Mourners, daughter of Mme. Monnier, for twenty-five years, in a room of Mme. Monnier’s house, The police, who were anonymously notified of the woman’s detention, entered the house and found Mdle. Monnier shut up in a room in darkness, lying on a mattress, stark naked, and so emaciated that she appeared to be a living skeleton. The room was covered with filth, bones, refuse, food, worms, rats, and all kinds of vermin. The unfortunate woman, who had partially lost her reason, was taken to a hospital. It was thought she would die, but she is now improving. Twenty-five years ago she was a beautiful brunette, and fell in love with a lawyer without means. Her mother disapproved of their love and confined her in the room which she has only recently left. The son after his arrest pleaded that he acted as he did

on account of filial piety, and that the mother was responsible. The lawyer died in ISSS. There was another dramatic development in the case to*day. Mine. Mourner died in prison of heart disease. The gravity of her crime was brought home to her at the Judge’s examination on Thursday. She became ill and died suddenly in the infirmary at the prison this afternoon.