LATE CABLE NEWS

Hokitika Guardian, 15 August 1930, Page 2

LATE CABLE NEWS

FALSE EVIDENCE. VICTIMS IN PRISON. SAN FRANCISCO, July 3(1. John Macdonald, a grey-haired whiter, has confessed ili.it the main evidence cn which Thomas Mooney and Warren Hillings were sentenced to imprisonment lor life at San Francisco in 1916 for the “Preparedness Day” bond) outrage was false. “The whole pack of lies was packed into my head,” Macdonald said today to a special Supreme Court Bench, indicating that the packing was done by Charles Flickert, district attorney. It is expo.ted that as the result ol the inquiry Mooney and Billings will soon be released. Through his tears the- self-confessed perjurer persisted that he identified photographs of Billings and Moonov a few days after the outrage when those photos had already been indicated to him by a police sergeant. He declared again and again that the district attorney had coached him in the evidence he gave before the grand jury.

capital punishment. COMMITTEE TO REPORT. LONDON, July 30. The Capital Punishment Committee which is to make its report next week is known to be hopelessly divided (says the political correspondent of the Daily Mail.) It is suggested that the minority may recommend the abolition of capital punishment, while the majority will urge the suspension of the death penalty for a period in order to observe whether'the substitution of imprisonment for life increases murders. Other members bold that there should be three degrees of murder, with the death penal y only for first degree cases.

MASTER Y CRUISER. STITT’ TO CARRY AIRCRAFT. WASHINGTON, July 30. A mystery cruiser, which may revolutionise America’s national defence policy, is being, designed by the Bureau of Aeronatics, to take advantage of the provisions of the London Naval Treaty, It is a Gin gun ship of between 9000 and 10,000 tons, designed to carry aeroplanes in the manner of an aircraft carrier. The designers have not reached a final decision as to the number of aeroplanes it will be possible lor such a ship to carry, but. it is known that it. will be in excess of 20. The designing of the ship lias been carried out in secret, and it was hoped that its adoption by the Navy Department could be brought about, and the first of the type completed, without the admiralties of other nations learning of the departure from the conventional types of fighting ships undertaken by the United States.