CAPITAL CHARGE

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 164, 11 June 1940, Page 8

CAPITAL CHARGE

THE WAIHI CASE. HEARING COMMENCED. Per Press Association. WAIHI,- Juno 10,. ■ Arrested at Waihi at the beginning of May in connection with the Wuikino tragedy of the night of April 2, Douglas Herbert Cartinan, single, aged 22, previously employed as a trucker in the Martha gold mine, and who had been several times remanded, appeared before Mr W. H. Freeman, S.M., in the Waihi Magistrate’s Court, this morning, charged with the murder, at Waikino, on April 2, of Elizabeth Agnes Hamilton' a married woman, aged 27, whose body was found the next morning in scrub by the wayside on the Waikino-Wnite-wheta Road, three miles away from where was discovered that of Lloyd Moran, aged 15, the son of the then proprietor of the Waikino Hotel, Mr J. J. Moran, now of Auckland. Young Moran and Mrs Hamilton, who was a cook employed by his father, had gone’ for a stroll the evening before. The arrest was made by Detective-Sergeants J. Thompson and J. Walsh. „ _ The Crown Prosecutor (Mr V. R. Meredith), with him Mr N. 1. Smith, is conducting the case for the prosecution, and Mr F. McCarthy (Auckland' appears for accused. No Fewer than 28 witnesses havo been subpoeaned, and it is expected that the hearing will last at least two full days. The first witness was Stanley Eric Anderson, Public Works Department engineer at Paeroa, who surveyed the Paeroa-Waihi Highways from 15 chains on the Paoroa side of the Waikino Hotel. He detailed the measurements taken, including one of 150 ft where a oar tyre track left the roadway to Where it rejoined the road; two skidmarks, one of 77ft and another of 21ft, were observed, together with a mark 6ft in length beginning at the end of the former mark. Other marks np-. peared to have been made by an object having been dragged over the consolidated clay. Witness also produced plans showing where both bodies were found, and detailed the position of the numerous' bloodstains in the immediate vicinity of where the boy was found, at a point 16ft below tlie road, from whence the bloodstains led. Acting-Sergeant T. Dunn had shown where a tyre lever and part of a woman’s clothing had been found near Mrs Hamilton’s body. Constable A. A. Gudsell (Hamilton) produced photographs of the two bodies and of the principal localities mentioned in the previous witness’s evidence. Constable V. Naylor (Auckland) produced further photographs relating to the site of a motor-car accident near the Waikino Hotel and of accused’s house and garage in Walmsley Road, Waihi, A skirt found in a I gully in Willows Road, and a shoe in the scrub at the back of accused’s house were the subjects o’f other photographs. CLOTHING IDENTIFIED. Olw’yn Mary Shaw, a waitress at the Waikino Hotel, said that Mrs Hamilton on the evening of April 2 wore a smock, over her costume and jumper, canvas shoes and no stockings. A few minutes later she came to witness’s room wearing the same, clothes, except that a green cardigan had replaced the smock. As witness was .not ready to go, Mrs Hamilton remarked that she would go for a walk with Lloyd Moran, and then went downstairs. Several articles of clothing were identified by witness as having been worn by Mrs Hamilton on April 2. The Court was then adjourned.