AN AUCKLAND SENSATION.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 219, 27 January 1917, Page 4

AN AUCKLAND SENSATION.

AUCKLAND, Jan. 26. A middle-aged man named Thomas Edward Watts Skelton was charged at the police court to-day with attempting the murder of his wife Alice Mary Skelton, at Pahi on January 4. The case was remanded until Wednesday. It is alleged that accused had been drinking heavily, and quarellcd with his wife, expressing his intention of cutting her throat. He left the room, and in his absence Mrs A atts started to, leave the house with her six-year-old child. As she was seen approaching the gate, the accused was seen by a neighbour following her with an open razor. Before the accused could reach her the neighbour had shut the gate. The man was apparently under the impression that the woman was in the neighbour's house, whan he hit her with an axe and a flat spear, making a lunge at the neighbour. On being evaded the accused went to the front door and smashed it in with an axe. The Justice of the Peace at Maun gate ruto dismissed the charge of attempted murder, and of assault on a neighbour, but the accused was re-arrested on another charge and brought to Auckland, where the “attempted murder” charge was included.