The Wrong Answer

Gisborne Times, Volume VI, Issue 275, 29 November 1901, Page 3

The Wrong Answer

Paris, October 11. The Mounter sequestration case, which has been followed with unabated interest all over France, came to a termination to-day, when a sentence of fifteen months’ imprisonment was passed on M. Marcel Mounter, formerly a sub-prefect, who was guilty of being an accomplice with bis

mother in compelling his sister, Blanche Monnier, to submit to forciblo seclusion. Mme. Monnier, the mother, succumbed to heart disease shortly after her arrest.

The authorities at Poitiers were informed last May that Mile. Blanche Monnier was virtually a prisoner in her mother’s home. The police soarched the premises and found the unfortunate woman lying in a starving condition, surrounded by indescribable filth. She weighed only 501 b, and was totally destitute of clothing, and had no strength even to walk. Tho windows of the room in which she was kept were said to have been closed for twenty years, and iron shutters effectually prevented fresh air or light from entering.

There was a great outcry throughout France against the woman’s relatives, and popular feeling was so worked up that a number of other sequestration cases were discovered in various parts of the country.