Murderer Confesses

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 305, 16 March 1928, Page 10

Murderer Confesses

UNDER THIRD DEGREE FOR 20 HOURS

Crowd Demands Execution

By Cable.—Press Association. — Copyright. Received 12.40 p.m. PARIS, Thursday. A* •J^ v questioned for nearly 20 hours, from nine . °’. clock yesterday morning to 4.30 a.m. to-day, with only brief intervals for meals, a jeweller named Mesterino eoiifessed to the murder of Gaston Trupliene whose burned bodv was found by the roadside near Melun on February 28. At the end of that time he was exhausted mentally and physically.

Toward the end of the examination the police, two at a time, took turns flinging questions at lVlesterino, until his resistance was ended. He murmured, “Yes, I did it. For pity's sake give me a rest.” Then he collapsed. Next morning the police took Mcsterlno to his house in the Rue St. Augustin, for a reconstruction of the crime. An immense crowd outside was most hostile, shouting, “To the guillotine!” Mesterino confessed that Truphene demanded money, and In the course of a violent quarrel, Truphene was knocked to the floor and hit his head on the corner of a table. When he recovered consciousness he shouted “Help!” Mesterino then lost his head and suffocated Truphene, stuffing a wad of cotton into his mouth. He tied up

the body and drove it to Melun in his car and burned it. Then he returned to Paris and continued his business. A large part of the jewels formerly in Truphene’s possession have been recovered. Mesterino did up two packages and gave one to his sister-in-law and the other to his aunt to keep. Neither of them knew the contents of the parcels.—A. and N.Z. The bound body of Gaston Truphene, a travelling jeweller, burned so as to be unrecognisable, was found in a ditch near Melun on February 2S. A theory was later advanced that Truphene, who had about £6,000 in money and diamonds in his possession, murdered an unknown man, and so burned the body that it was unrecognisable, then dressed it in his own clothes and absconded with the jewels, hoping the police would think him dead.