DOMESTIC TRAGEDY.

Taranaki Daily News, 26 May 1920, Page 5

DOMESTIC TRAGEDY.

AGED FATHER ON TRIAL. ALLEGED MURDER .OF DAUGHTER. By Telegraph.—Pr?3s Assoeintion. Dunedin, Last Night. As a result of the tragedy at Rongahere on the /lath inst., when a farmer named John Sharp, aged 72, is alleged to have fatally injured his daughter in a fit pt temper, Sharp was charged today at Balclutha, before Mr. E. D. Mosley, S.M., with murdering Sophia McLean Sharp", aged 7. « Constable Findlay said he went to Rongahcre on the morning of the 10th., and there saw the deceased lying on a sofa. She was unconscious and had several injuries on her head. One of her fingers, was also badly broken. A doctor attended her and arranged to'remove her to the Dunedin hospital. He took her in his car, and returned "an hour and a half later with the body of the girl, she having died on the way. Witness found a slick produced about (en yard- outside the front door of ncciised's house. A quantity of hair was attached to the stick, ami ihero was a pool of bipod near where it was lying. David Ireland said he found the deceased lying on the ground insensible Her head and face were covered with Wood. Witness removed her to his house and sent for a doctor. "When the depositions of the last two witnesses were read over to the accused lie remarked, "It's the wrong stick-'' Sergeant Kidd said that on the morninn- of the 16th the accused on'led a! the police station at Lawrence and told him Hint he hart assaulted'his little dnnghti-r Sophia, and lie thought her injuries were of a serious nature. Witness asked him why lie had assaulted her, and he replied that Ills eldest daughter had assaulted him on the previous night by catching litin by his whHu'iY. and throwing him on to' the floor, and that the. three youngest sisters assisted her to assault him. After gpttins free, lie said ho picked up a piece of wood from' a bnx and ran after (lie older girls, but he was unable to catch them. On his way back to the house he met: Sophia and struck her with a piece of wooir Witness then arrested him, nnn »*er ascertained that the girl-was dead. Witness told accused that she was dead, and he replied that she was as well dead as to he half alive for the remainder of her life. Witness then (barged him with murder. Tie made a statement in which he said that he struck deceased with a piece, of wood on her head. Crossexamined, witness sale- accused was examined by two doctors in Lawrence lockup as to his state of mind. Accused, who wrs very dull of hearing, reserved his defence and was committed for trial at the sittings of the Supreme Court at Dunedin in. August. Bail was not asked for. At the adjourned inquest on the victim of the murder the Coroner returned a verdict that death was due to a fractured skull with concussion and laceration of the brain substance, caused by blows inflicted by the girl's father.