SHOT DEAD ON ROAD

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 123, 15 August 1927, Page 3

SHOT DEAD ON ROAD

CRIME OF DISCARDED LOVER While Miss Hilda Booth, aged 22, of Pinxton, near Arfreton, Derbyshire, was walking with her mother along the main road between South Normanton on Pinxton, England, a young man with whom she had kept company, John Henry Lees, aged 22, a farmer, is alleged to have shot her and then killed himself. A few seconds later an omnibus filled with people came along the road, and seeing three bodies in the road the driver stopped. Both Miss Booth and Lees were dead from severe head injuries. Mrs. Booth was in a faint. Mrs. S. F. Booth, of Pinxton, a relative of the dead girl, told a “Daily Mail” reporter that about a month ago Miss Booth and Lees had a quarrel. She added; “This afternoon, Hilda and her mother went to South Normanton to see a married sister. They were walking back when they heard someone running across a field by the side of the road. Mrs. Booth turned and saw Lees. Thinking that he wanted to talk to her daughter she walked on. “Suddenly she heard a shot, and turning she saw Hilda fall dead. Lees ran a few yards and then he dropped dead. Just before Lees fell an errand boy on a bicycle, seeing the dead girl ori the ground, ran up to Lees and cried, ‘Oh, what have you done.’ ”