SUICIDE IN KARANGAHAPE ROAD. EAT POISON AGAIN.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 247, 17 March 1888, Page 7

SUICIDE IN KARANGAHAPE ROAD. EAT POISON AGAIN.

Auckland, March 14. Yestkkday afternoon a man named William Luker commibted.&uicide by deliberately swallowing poison. The facts are ft s follows : Luker had been lodging with Mr T. C. Turner, in Earanghape Road. For the pasb foAV months he has appeared molancholy, and yesterday morning was unusually depies&ed in spirits. About 9 a.m. yesterday ho loft the house without stating whero ho was going. Shortly after 3 o'clock he returned. Mr Turner nt once noticed that Luker was doathly pale. Ho a&ked him what was the matter, whereupon Luker replied that he had been in the Cemetery, and had been taken sick with vomiting. Luker then wont into the sitting room, and sat down on a couch. After he had lain there for about an hour he stood up, and said he was going to Mr Powell's, a& ho had taken poisonMr Powell is a chemist, carrying on business in Karangahape Road. Mr Turner at onco hurried Luker off to the chemist's, who administered a strong emetic of peroxide of iron and lime water. Meanwhile, Mr Turner communicated the intelligence to the police. The local constable, Mr Clark, being on duty at the Supreme Court, he was promptly summoned by telephone, and arriving in a cab, removed Luker to the District Hospital. Drs. Lindsay and Bell immediately administered more emetics and also restoratives, but without success, and the unfortunate man died at a quarter past 11 o'clock last evening. .Deceased was a married man, his wife and two children living in England, at the present time residing with his relatives. He had been in the colony for two years. The poor fellow has been an inmate of the Avondale Lunatic Asylum, from which institution he was only released last November. Since that timo he has resided with Mr Turner, who kindly befriended him, as ho had no relatives in Auckland. Further enquiries have elicited the fact that about 10 a.m. yesterday Luker called at the chemist shop of Mr E. B. Hill in Eden Terrace. He asked for some poison for rats. Mr Hill sold him a box of poison which was an American preparation similar to Rough on Rats. Luker duly signed for the poUon, putting do\vn W. King as his

name. He asked for directions aa to the use of the poison, and was informed that he might mix ib with cheese or broad and butter. While in the cab with Constable Clark, Luker explained that he had bought six jam tarts at a confectioner's shop in Symonds-atreet and then put the poison into the tartu and ate them. Ho gave as a reason for his action that he was tired of life. Information of the occurrence -was conveyed to the Coroner, Dr. Phils-on, who decided to hold am inquest at the Hospital. That is now proceeding as we go to press.