The Last Party

New Zealand Listener, Volume 5, Issue 117, 19 September 1941, Page 5

The Last Party

T this stage, the idea of ridding himself for all time of this encumbrance of a wife whilst retaining her worldly goods must have become Crippin’s main thought in life. He was soon to put these thoughts into practice. On January 18 he bought five grains of a certain poisonous drug from a chemist. A medical dose of this drug was a one-hundredth to a two-hundredth of a grain. He therefore bought enough of the drug for five hundred to one thousand doses. In fact, the chemist had to send to the wholesalers to enable them to supply such a large quantity, but they thought nothing of the order, as Crippen frequently bought poisonous drugs to use in the manufacture of patent medicine, and so they regarded the request as quite a legitimate one and in the ordinary course of business. Now the Crippens had two particular friends, named Mr. and Mrs. Paul Martinetti, and they were in the habit of dining with these people regularly each week. On January 31 they dined together at Crippen’s house. *t turned out to be the last time. A jolly evening was spent together, but Mr. Martinetti became ill during the course of the evening,-and he and his wife went home early. From that moment onwards nobody ever again saw Cora Crippen alive. — (" Famous Cases," by a Dunedin Barrister, 4Y A, September 3.)