South Canterbury Times, MONDAY, OCTOBER 11, 1880.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2361, 11 October 1880, Page 2

South Canterbury Times, MONDAY, OCTOBER 11, 1880.

The atmosphere of the colony is fragrant with surprises. Our latest surprise comes from Dunedin. A hanging Jury has at last been discovered among the inhabitants of that city, and the youngest and mildest of our Judges has been induced to put on the black cap and pronounce sentence of death on a Chinaman. The conviction of Ah Lee for the Kyeburn murder is a departure from the morbid sentimentality which of late years has saved the necks of the members of the Thug family who have had the good fortune to be tried in Dunedin. It is true that the malefactor is only a Chinaman, but his sentence indicates a wholesome beginning. It shows that the fact is beginning to dawn on the common jurymen down South that life has its value as well as property. It proves further that the sympathy which should be bequeathed to the murdered and their kindred, is no longer diverted to the murderer.

The Kyeburn tragedy of which Ah Lee has been found to be the sole author is marked by circumstances of truly Oriental atrocity. Otago, and particularly Dunedin, has obtained an unenviable notoriety as the scene of cold-blooded horrors. But the murder for which this Chinaman has been sentenced excels in its revolting details the crimes for which Mrs Iloid, Waters, and Butler were arraigned. The victim was an unfortunate old woman of sixty, whose kind, benevolent, harmless disposition made her the friend of all who knew her—the enemy of none. She resided in a somewhat isolated neighborhood in a little hut about 200 yards away from the main road. The European population was scant and scattered, and widow Young’s nearest neighbors were Chinamen. One of these, Lee Guy, resided about sixty yards away, and he was in the habit of assisting the frail old woman by carrying water, breakingfirewood,&c., receivingin return many acts of kindness, Mrs Young was known to be in comfortable and even affluent circumstances. Her husband, an old digger, of whose adventures on the goldfields of Victoria and New Zealand

she had been a constant partner, had died in the hut where she was murdered a few years previously. It was rumored that she intended leaving the district, and the old woman look no pains to conceal her intentions. Just before her death she had paid a visit to the nearest township of any importance —Naseby, and the umrdererprobably concluded that she had withdrawn a portion if not the whole of her money from the bank. On the morning of Wednesday. August 4, Lee Guy, at an early hour, went to the houses of the nearest Europeans and reported in his broken English that the old woman was dying in her hut. She was found on the floor, fearfully injured but quite sensible and able to reply to the questions put to her. There were indications of a severe struggle ; the old woman’s wrists were bitten, her mouth shewed that she had been gagged, her chest had been fairly crushed in, eight of her ribs

were broken, some of them in several places, and some pieces of Chinese bagging, a couple of blood-stained handkerchiefs, and several large stones carried from her garden wall, showed the weapons with which the injuries were inflicted. From what she was able to state prior to her death the same afternoon, there could be no doubt that her murderer was a Chinaman. Whether more than one individual was connected with the crime is a question that will probably never be solved. The motive was evidently robbery. As regards the leading, and possibly only perpetrator, the chain of evidence was tolerably complete. To say nothing of Ah Leo’s confession, in which, while attempting to make Lee Guy the principal, he admits himself to have been an accessory, there are a variety of conclusive proofs of his guilt. One of the handkerchiefs found on the floor has been sworn to as belonging to Ah Lee, and the foot-prints near the garden where he went for the stones corresponded exactly with the boots that he wore. As for Lee Guy we are at a loss to conceive why he was arraigned for the murder at all, seeing that beyond the finding of an inkbottle in the garden, which is said to have belonged to him, and the presumption that he must have been awakened by the noise made by the perpetrator, there is no evidence whatever against him. So far as his conduct on the morning when the old woman was found weltering in her blood, is concerned, it is quite inconsistent with his guilt. If, as we are led to presume, Lee Guy is perfectly innocent, then the condemned criminal is a double dyed villian, for besides murdering this helpless old woman, he has attempted to swear away the life of one of his own countrymen.