MURDER OF A WIFE AND CHILD BY A PRIEST.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2552, 17 November 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)

MURDER OF A WIFE AND CHILD BY A PRIEST.

A terrible crime has just been committed at Olavania, in the Argentine Republic, by the priest of tho parish, Pedro Castro Rodriguez. Some years ago he contrived to contract marriage under a false name. His wife must have afterwards become acquainted with her husband's real position, for in order to avoid scandal, she went to reside at Buenos Ayres, together with a daughter born of the union. She had a certain amount of money, which, at her husband's suggestion, she lodged in his name at a bank. Pedro Rodriguez determined to get rid of both his wife and child, He got to Olavarria and poisoned them. He had, as he thought, taken such precautions as to secure impunity, and had got a coffin ready in the church, where he placed the two bodies during tbe night. They were buried the next day in the village cemetery, tho priest having secured a certificate under a false name and given it to the sexton. The lattcr's suspicions, however, had been aroused by seeing some spots of blood on tho wall of the church and in the passage leading to the priest's house, and he communicated them to the Chief of the Police at La Plata, who at once put the priest under arrest, exhumed the bodies, and obtained a full confession of what had occurred.