MURDERERS AT LARGE

Opotiki News, Volume II, Issue 180, 10 May 1939, Page 4

MURDERERS AT LARGE

CRIME IN N.S.W. . - UNSOLVED i' KILLINGS ,'y - . AN UNENVIABLE RECORD ' 3»-‘; \ / y j'" . March 23.—Public concern is being felt oyer the increase of serious crime in-. Sydney and th& . failure- -of. the liomieid'eL branch of the criminal investigation branch to solve many. murders in the State. With the shooting of Robert James Anderson, New South Wales has the unenviable, record of at least 12 murders in recent- years in which , there have been no convictions. F ! ach of- the murders has been committed ' since .the latest .scientific aids for crime detection have been added to the- facilities at the disposal, of the criminal investigation branch, of the Police Department. The list is as fellows : George Lynch, who ivas shot dead at the Top- Hatters’ Night Club at King’s Cross. '/ Dorothy M;Vy. Ererett, 27, v who was strangled in the grounds;; of the Broughton School, Newcastle. Mrs. -Dorothy Thorne, poisoned with a drug placed in a sekllitz powder at her home at- Cremorne. f James Smith, whose murder was known as the “Shark Arm Mystery.” as pqrtio»kyqf;hik'arm,\y3^ v found in a shark captured coast, and whose body was never foqlid. Richard William Lloyd Holmes, heat builder, of McMahon’s Point, who was chief witness in the “Shark Arm Mystery,” and who was lured to Miller’s Point and shot dead in a car. Mrs. IF.|:lmr Andrews, battered to death 'as she was entering her home at Auburn. /'/ Mrs. Margrethe O'Brien, whose ' strangled body was placed in a bag ! and thrown over a fence at Parra- * matta. Airs. Jane Maria Gash and her baby son, Stanley, who was shot and their bodies burned in tlieir home at Morundali. j William Henry Lavers, garage proprietor, near Grenfell, who is believed * to have been killed with a tyre lever outside bis garage, and whose body was never found. Mrs. Willis and Luigi Orilga, an Italian, shot as they were driving across a bridge near Forbes. Alfred Meat Smith, organiser of the Australian Meat Industry Employees’ Union, end his wife. Mrs. Maiy Ann Smith, who were blown io pieces by a bomb thrown through the window of their bedroom at Auburn. Police Viewpoint It was stated on behalf of the police yesterday that so many restrictions were now placed on them that- they were seriously handicapped in their investigations of major crimes.

Their inability under the ruling of the Chief Justice, Sir Frederick Jordan, to take a man to a police station to question him unless they intended charging him, was the chief obstruction, they claimed. Before the ruling by the Chief Justice criminals and! other suspects were taken to the station for questioning and sometimes convicted cf robberies and other offences for which they had not been suspected. Now men whom defectives believe arc concerned with reported offences not only defy detectives to take them to a police station for questioning, hut they use their immunity to “stand over” their victims and extort money. Many of the victims have beeii threatened by these criminals that if they persisted in their demand for police action they would be dealt with; Thus, the police claim, the public, whom the police desire to protect, are also victims of the court ruling. “The position now,” said one prominent police officer yesterday, “is that many detectives will not risk an action for damages and possibly jeo-. pardi.se their position in the police force by attempting to question a suspect unless they have all the evidence necessary to warrant his arrest, and there is a reasonable chance of having him convicted. While mostmembers of the force are anxious to give. loyal service by protecting the public and apprehending law-break-ers, they often have to allow suspects to defy them and laugh at them.”