POISONING CASE

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 4 July 1924, Page 5

POISONING CASE

TRIAL FOR MURDER. GREAT INTEREST SHOWN. BY CABLE—PRESS ASSOCIATION—COPYRIGHT LONDON, July 2. The trial of the Frenchman Vaquier, on a charge of murdering Alfred G. P. Jones, licensee of the Blue Anchor Hotel in Byfleet, Surrey, has commenced at Guilford. After gasping that he thought he had taken poison, Jones expired within 15 minutes of swallowing a dose of bromoseltzer on the morning of March 29. As the result of investigations Vaquier, who was said to have purchased poison from a chemist, was arrested by the police. At the trial there was a large crowd, comprised mostly of fashionably-dressecl young women, who waited in a queue outside the court. ' Vaquier pleaded not guilty. Mr Patrick Hastings, K.C., and Sir E. Marshall Hall, Iv.C., prosecuted. Mr Cur-tis-Bennett appeared for the defence. Mr Hastings said the Crown sought to prove that in the nature of the relations between the accused and Mrs Jones lay the motive for the crime. * The defence was that Mrs Jones was a woman of the type for whom no one would commit a crime. Mrs Jones was examined for nine hours. She denied improper relations with Vaquier, or that she misconducted herself with her solicitor during her husband’s illness.