Alleged Poisoning by a Wife.

Te Aroha News, Volume III, Issue 109, 4 July 1885, Page 6

Alleged Poisoning by a Wife.

At the Stratford Petty Sessions Charlotte Johnson, 44, living at 6, Norfolk Villas, Grove Road, Walthametow, was charged with unlawfully and maliciously causing to be administered to Charles Johnson, her husband, at various times during the last 12 months, certain poisonous or noxious drugs, with intent to injure, aggrieve, and annoy him. The prisoner, it seems, has lived apart from her husband for about 12 months, whilst her husband is living with a woman named Walker. At various times Johnson and Walker had been ill, and suspecting something was wrong, the children to the parties were questioned, and, the police making investigations, Mary Anne Walker, aged 10, made a statement to them, as did the son of the prisoner, a lad of 12. The ; latter stated that when he visited his mother about a year ago she gave him something wrrraped up in a papor, which had the word " poison " outside. She told him to put it in something his father was eating or drinking. He put it into his father's tea. His father drank the tea, and it made him ill. His mother had given nearly a dozen powders, and he had given them to his father during the past 12 months. The prisoner denied the statements of the boy, whom she called a wicked lad, and asserted that she had given the children money for food to keep them from starving. At this point tho prisoner was remanded, bail being refused,