MYSTERY DEATHS

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 956, 26 April 1930, Page 8

MYSTERY DEATHS

BEAUTIFUL FRENCH SISTERS IN DRAMA POISONING SUSPECTED Two beautiful sisters are the victims of a dramatic poisoning mystery that is causing a sensation throughout the South of France. * They were the first and second wives respectively of Dr. Pierre Laget and both died under mysterious circumstances. The doctor was arrested on a charge of attempting to murder his sister, and this led to the exhumation of his two dead wives. One of the supposed crimes had not been suspected for eight years. Called in to attend Mile. Marie Louise Laget, a young woman who was then living with her brother, Dr. Laget, and her mother, at Beziers, in the Herault Department, Dr. Roulland found that she was slowly dying of poison. He informed the public prosecutor, and Dr. Laget was arrested, and charged with attempted murder. Dr. Laget’s first wife, Mile. Sarah Alexandre, was 21 years of age at the time she married him. Fatal Symptoms Young Mms. Laget died in May, 1922, after a short and painful illness. Later the doctor married the dead woman’s sister, Mile. Suzane Alexandre, an attractive woman of 28. She died last April after an illness precisely similar to that which proved fatal to her sister seven years before. She was insured for £SOO and the insurance company, satisfied that she had died a natural death, paid the amount. Some time earlier Dr. Laget had inherited £3,200 from an aunt, Mme. Pitoizet, and a similar sum from his father. He had also borrowed £BOO from his sister. Letter to His Lover . The police discovered a prescription at a local chemist’s by means of which Dr. Laget had procured a considerable amount of poison. This was followed by the finding of a letter to his mistress, a Madame Masse-Baluze, in which lie declared that the removal of his sister to hospital was “a catastrophe” for him, for it would most likely be said, as a result, that he had poisoned his two wives. The bodies of the two women were exhumed and poison was found in that of the younger sister. “Lynch the Poisoner” A dramatic scene was witnessed when the police escorted Dr. Laget to his house to be confronted with his mother. A vast crowd shouted: “Death to the murderer!” and “Lynch the poisoner!” Dr. Laget was taken to the hospital t.o be confronted with his sister. As he left, a woman in black shouted at him: —- “What have you done with my daughters, you assassin?” I gave you my two beautiful daughters, and you give me two corpses!” The woman was Mme. Alexandre. It has been discovered that Dr. Laget led a very gay life, though he had very few patients. He ran through £S,OOO, inherited, received from the insurance company or borrowed, in a comparatively short time. The police are now inquiring into the death of Dr. Laget’s aunt, Mme. Pitoizet, as they suspect she may have died of poison. /