PASTOR CHARGED.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 143, 13 December 1911, Page 8

PASTOR CHARGED.

MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF A GIRL. STARTLING* ARREST. A great sensation has bene caused in Boston (U.S.A.) by the arrest of the Rev. Clarence Richeson, pastor of the Emmanuel Baptist Church, one of the most fashionable churches here. The clergyman has been arrested on a charge of being concerned in the death of Miss Avis Linnell, who was found dead on October 14 in a room at the Young Women's Christian Association, of which she was a member. The girl died through taking a dose of cyanide of potassium, and the circumstances surrounding the whole case are romantic and peculiar. Miss Linnell was a beautiful girl of 10, and while living with her widowed mother, was pursuing a course of study at the Boston Conservatory of Music. She and her mother were members of the church over which Mr. Richeson presided, and the clergyman was known to call at their house very frequently. I It was rumored that the pastor and [ Miss Linnell were engaged to be married, and though Mr Richeson denies that this was a fact, it is known that the young girl had prepared her trousseau, and was looking forward to her wedding i day. On October 14, the day on which she was found to have taken poison, a' notice was printed in the local newspapers announcing the forthcoming wedding of the Rev. Clarence Richeson to Miss Violet Edmends, the daughter of one of Boston's millionaire merchants, and the date was fixed for October 31. Very shortly after this notice appeared Miss Linnell drank the cyanide of potassium at the Y.W.C.A. building, and it was naturally supposed that she committed suicide through grief. At the inquest, however, her 'mother, though not denying her daughter's engagement to the clergyman, declared that Avis had not seen the newspapers with the an- | nouncement, and that in taking the poison she thought she was taking a harmless medicine. The inquest was postponed for further enquiry, and the other night a chemist, who had been reading the case in the newspapers, told.the police that six hours before the tragedy of the young girl's death occurred, he sold to Mr. Richeson cyanide of potassium, which the clergyman said he wanted to kill a dog with. The arrest of the clergyman was (most dramatic. Not finding him at his own rooms, the police went to the house of Mr. Edmends, -which is a fine mansion in the exclusive Back Bay district, and there took the parson in custody while he was assisting Miss Edmends in the receipt and arranging of. the wedding presents, which were arriving in great numbers for the young couple. Mr. Richeson was arraigned in court, and on the charge being read to him pleaded not guilty. The judge, however, refused to grant him bail, and he was confined in a cell. The clergyman, who is 33 years of age, has had his pastorate in Boston for some years, and is exceed- 1 ingly popular. He will not lack friends to help him, and already he has received' I numerous offers of assistance, while sevI eral rich men of his congregation have I offered bonds for his bail if it should I be allowed.