CONFESSIONS OF MURDER.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2433, 23 February 1909, Page 6

CONFESSIONS OF MURDER.

GERMAN POLICE METHODS

Two confessions .-of murder in one day arc to be placed to the credit of the system which gives the German police a free hand in the cross-exa-mination of prisoners. A shop assistant named Richard lieukel excited suspicion while attempting to pawn five rings, the ■police were called in, and the rings were recognised as having been stolen from the jeweller Frankfurter', who was shot dead at Vienna on December 8. Henkel at first attempted to prove ian alibi, which he had evidently premeditated before the crime, but finally broke down under severe cross-questioning, and admitted- his guilt. He then told how, driven desperate by privation, he went info the jeweller’s shop holding a cocked pistol in his pocket, and while Herr Frankfurter was showing him some chains, drew the weapon out and shot him through the head. . The other confession was obtained from tho architect Maagh, a fellow - traveller of the insurance agent Regel, who was found shot dead ill an early morning train from Coblenz to Treves, on December 10. In tins case the admission of guilt was only obtained after the prisoner had been examined day after day for hours at a time, and after he had involved himself in an inextricable web of contradictions. Maagh’s motive for killing his friend was the hope of finding on the body enough money to relieve the financial embarrassment in which-he had managed to involve himself.