A MODERN INQUISITION.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXIX, Issue 3762, 19 March 1907, Page 4

A MODERN INQUISITION.

A harrowing story of torture, said to have been systematically carried on in the Riga prison, is told in the Berlin Vorwarts, by a political prisoner, who gives the names of 16 persons who, he declares, have undergone it. The allegation is that torture is carried on every night of the week except Sundays, from ten p.m. or midnight till about six in the morning, in a special chamber on the second floor of the prison containing all sorts of instruments of torture, such as rubber sticks, pincers, long pins, etc., as well as a rack, on which the victim is stretched, bound hand and foot, with a wet rag over his mouth. It is done in the presencee of spies and police, and not unfrequently in that of higher dignitaries and the local nobility, who constitute the “Selfdefence League. ’ ’ Thus on November 29, torture was used in' the presence of Baron Raden, the district chief, and at another time under the eyes of Baron Rekke, the reputed organiser of the pogrom at Tukkum. The modus operandi is said to be as follows :—The victim is brought into the room and stripped of all his clothes. He is then told to name his friends and ‘ ‘ accomplices. ’ ’ Should he refuse, they stretch him on the, rack and give him a number of strokes with a rubber stick—sometimes several hundred. With a view to heightening the pain, salt is often strewn over the wounds, and the flogging continues until the victim becomes senseless. He is then brought back to' his senses, and again asked to name his accomplices. If he continues to be obstinate they tear out his nails and his hair, and pierce through his hands and feet with long pins. Should this again prove of no avail the torturers tear out pieces of flesh from his body with hot pincers, knock out his teeth, and perform other \ indescribable cruelties. The writer then tells the story of one Griming, 24 years old, who proved 11 obstinate ’ ’ to the last, and underwent the whole series of torture from the first stage to the last. The inquisition in this case lasted three weeks, after which the victim was handed to a court-martial and shot. All the hair from his beard was plucked out, and the hair on his head had turned grey. His face was horribly mutilated, in many places his skin was torn or scraped off, and his spine and several ribs broken.