FATALLY WOUNDED

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 3, Issue 672, 26 October 1933, Page 3

FATALLY WOUNDED

BOY'S MISADYENTURE IN MOCK STILETTO DUEL. A dramatic story of how a schoolboy received a fatal wound during a mock stiletto duel with a girl, wh'o later offered her own blood to save his life, was unfolded at a recent inquest at Herne Bay, Engjand, say» an over&eas paper. The tragic accident occurred during a fete at a local cricket ground, the victim being Arthur Robert Pearson, aged 15. Louise Fasciotti, aged)„;19, a tall, beautiful Italian girl, who stated that she was in England to learn English, told the coroner (Mr. A. K. Mowll) that she met Pearson a.t the fete with three other boys. She had only known him three days. At an earlier meeting, at which his sister and another boy friend were present, Pearson had s'hown them two stilettos, which they threw at the wall of a hut "like Red Indians." During the fete witnes^ said the boy handed her a. stiletto and took up the attitude -of a swordsman. "I took up the same attitude," the girl continued, "and we crossed stilettos. We only played about in the air, and I think it is impossible that it was my stiletto that wounded h'im, because I did no-t feel any resistance against it. He moved his foot and lunged forward, and then ran away." The girl demonstrated how she and Pearson held the stilettos, and added that Pearson's upraised arm made it impossible for her to have inflicted the wound. She fhought that he drew his stiletto towards himself. She had previously shown him how one could twist a stiletto round and strike oneself with the handle. She th'ought he was doing the same thing, and forgot to .turn the blade. Leslie Plowright, a former prcfect at the dead boy's school, gave evidsnce that Pearson suddenly stumbled towards Miss Fasciotti and cried out, "Good God." The boy's father stated that Miss Fasciotti came to see him the moming after the tragedy, and, unaware that his son had died, offered to give some of her blood to save his life. She collapsed on hearing of his death. Dr. F. C. Cozens, who was on the fete ground, and answered a summons broadcast by loudspeakers,. expressed th'e opinion that the wound pointed to Pearson having accidentally stabhed himself. The coroner said he had no doubt that the jury would come to the conclusion that the boy had accidentally stabbed himself. Rsferring to Miss Fasciotti, the coroner added: "W>e do not want this girl to go back to her own country with the feeling she has killed, although quite innocently, this young boy." The jury found that Pearson died from a self -inflicted wound, and a verdict of misadventure was recorded. They exonerated Miss 'Fasciotti from blame.