THE NEW YORK SENSATION

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 392, 18 May 1910, Page 5

THE NEW YORK SENSATION

DR. HYDE FOUND GUILTY. IMPRISONMENT FOR LIFE. By Cable—Press Association—Copyright. New York, May 16. The jury, after deliberating since Friday in the ease in which Dr. Hyde is charged with the murder of Colonel Swope, found accused guilty in the first degree. He was sentenced to imprisonment for life. It was charged that Dr. Hyde, who was held in great esteem locally as a physician " who kept abreast of the times," took typhoid germs and placed them in water, and, .by administering them, tried to kill various members or the Swope family, with whom he was allied by marriage, and from whom he expected to inherit money. He is accused of poisoning old Colonel Swope and Christiiian Swope, and by means of typhoid germs he tried, it is alleged, to murder eight other members or friends of the Swope household. Colonel Swope was buried without the suspicion of foul play arising, the medical certificate being given by Dr. Hyde. Then came the establishment <xf a series of inquiries by one of the executors, who caused the bodies to be exuumed. The outcome was the arrest of Dr. Hyde and his release on bail. The Coroner's jury dis agreed, but the police went ahead with ( their case against the doctor. Mrs. Logan Swope, mother of Mrs. Hyde, while being examined before the Grand Jury, with the tears coursing down her cheeks, repeatedly rose from the witness-chair in her excitement She told the story of the courtship of Dr. Hyde, and how she had tried to like him as her son-in-law, of her belief that he had attempted to murder her relatives, arid at one time tried to ipoison her. "On December 12 last he brought me a glass of water that tasted bitter," said Mrs. Swope. "I drank some, and, noticing the peculiar taste, asked him where he got it. 'Out .pf the water-cooler,' he replied. 'He ds trying to poison you, mother,' said one of my daughters. I demanded that he should give me an emetic, and this probably saved my life. Dr. Hyde married my daughter for her money. He followed her like a hawk would follow a hen. She was his prospective prey." Dr. Hyde kept remarkably cool, and said he was absolutely innocent, and, so far from trying to murder the Swopes, he declared humorously that the Swopes were trying to "swipe" [steal] him.