INQUEST.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1339, 12 May 1885, Page 2

INQUEST.

An inquest was held in the Geraldine Hotel on Saturday, before H. C..S. Baddeley, Esq., Coroner, touching* the death of John lioid, whose body was found in the Raukapuka Bush on Wednesday. The following jury were empanelled :—-D. Denoon (foreman), R. Johnston, J. Dean, N. Clouston, D. Andrews, M, Conolly, A. Fisher, J. Joe, R. Weil, and E. HardcßStle. Andrew Raid, sworn, said : lam a farmer Hying on the Woodbury and Geraldine Road. I know deceased. I identify the body by the clothes as that of my brother John. They are the clothes he wore when I last saw him alire. He had one leg slightly longer than the other. It was about 10 o'clock on the morning of the 2nd February that I saw him last, as I was going from home. lie had been drinking before, ancUiehada little drink with another man the night he came. He came to my place on the 29th January, and from then till the day I missed him he was suffering from the effects of drink. He never said anything to me to lead me to think he was going to take his life. Whan he left I thought he had gone to Ghristcburcb. He always teemed in a state of anxiety about his marriage. It is about half a mile from my place to where the body was found in the bush. I was told by William Rae ajjbout the body being discovered, and I went back with Rae and found the head hanging by the rope and the body lying on the ground. I recognised the clothes. William Rae, sworn, said : I live with my father, near the Woodbury and Geraldine road, On Wednesday, the 6th inst., I wbs shooting in the Raukapuka Bush, and I found the body lying at the foot of s tree. The head was hanging on-the tree. I then went and told Mr Reid. I went back with him to the body and he recognised it as the body of his brother John. To the jury : I met Mr Reid in his paddock. He was the first person I saw. I then went and told my father and he went to Mr Reid's with me. To the Foreman : Mr Reid's was the nearest house to whese the body was lying. Will. Willoughby: I am mounted Constable of Police, stationed at Geraldine. On the evening of the 6th inst. Mr A. Reid reported finding a body in the Raukapuka Bush, which he believed to be that of his brother. On the morning of the 7th I went to fetch the body, and found it lying at the foot of a tree with the legs doubled underneath and lying in a heap, as if it had fallen from a perpendicular position. The head was hanging in the noose of the rope about sft. Gin from the ground. Deceased was about sft 7in in height. On searching , the body I found the pocket-book fproduced) which had been kept as a timebook on the Greenfields Ptation, Otago. I also found a receipt for £8 5s from on Accident Insurance Cbrppany in favor of John Reid. He was wanted by the police to give evidence in a land dummyism case in Otago. He was overseer ploughman on the Greenfields station.

A. Reid, re-callod : My brother told me he was trying to avoid appearing as a witness in a land durarayisra case in Otago, but it did not eeem to prey on bis mind.

The jury, after a short deliberation, brought in a verdict to the effect " That John Keii came to his death by bangiug himself, while laboring under a state of temporary insanity."