BOYS TERRIBLE CRIME.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 977, 8 April 1911, Page 3

BOYS TERRIBLE CRIME.

Sydney, April 6. The trial of the two lads charged with murdering Mrs Warby and her daughter 011 January 28 began to-day. The boys, William Francis Millar, 16 years of age, and Reginald Clare, 17 are charged with having shot Mrs Sarah Warby, 62, and Miss Amy May Warby, 23, at Billeubah sheep station, near Narrandera, on the south beat of the Murrumbidgee, on the date named.

The station is owned by the Warby family, who have been old and respected residents in the district for years. The boys had been employed on the property. On the afternoon of Saturday, January 28, while the menfolk were away, the tragedy occurred. Wrs Warby, on emerging from an outhouse in the garden, was shot in the head, and dropped. Miss Warby, on hearing, the report, came from the bouse, and seeing the boy after her, ran in the direction of the paddock. She was then shot, falling dead from the effects of two bullets, of which one hit her in the head.

It was alleged at the inquest that the boys had intended to shoot a station hand named Dunn, get all the loose cash, and set fire to the homestead, burning the bodies.

Each of the prisoners stated in his evidence to-day that the other did the shooting. Clare said that after planning the crime he and Millar had played games ot cards to decide the part

each was to lake. He won the first game, which decided that he was to rob the farm. Millar won the second, which involved the shooting.

The police stated that Clare’s pea rifle was clean, w’hereas Millar’s showed signs of having been fired. Both the accused were found guilty by the jury, and sentenced to death.