A REIGN OF CRIME.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2497, 10 May 1909, Page 2

A REIGN OF CRIME.

MURDERS IN NEW CALEDONIA,

, :i NOUMEA, April 14. A series of .terrible crimes wa:»-'re-vealed at tile Quarter Sessions just ended. The , perpetrators, will be henceforth known at the “Red Band of tho North.” One of the. leaders of this band, a liberated Arab convict, Zermani, was summarily shot by a gendarme. Ox the other live Grimigui, a free man, son of an ex-convict, was sentenced to twenty' '-ears; Santacroce, a - liberated convict, to ten years; Santacrose, a liberated ..convict to twenty years’ imprisonment, and Arrigbi, a liberated convict was condemned . to death, the execution to take place on the public square at Noumea. The scenes of their crimes was Pouembout and Ivone, an agricultural district of the north-west, and lias lately come into prominence through its exportation of nickel ore. - The industry has attracted to the district an unusual number of miners and workers enged in the shipping operations. The evidence at the trial disclosed the fact that there are three unknown victims. The first murder was instigated by the storekeeper, Grimigui, under the following circumstances: —A tie’ket-of-leavo man, named) Vincent, was a creditor of Grimigui for 8200 francs (.£328). for which an arrangement had been made for the! payment of 1000 francs per month (£4O), which, at the date due, Grimigui failed to pay. An arrangement had .been made with the gang to do away with Vincent, and steal his paper securities. The gang, for this crime, was paid 15001 francs (£6O). All this was explained by the woman Vosin, who participated in a dinner at which, the murder was planned to take place. She was paid 500 francs (£2O) as the first instalment of the price of her complicity. Vincent was shot during the burning of his house, which was constructed of grass. A mouth afterwards a second man, named Franchiski, was disposed of in exactly the same manner, and two days following, r. third, an escaped convict, named.Rostouehor, was shot whilst mi the road. This-mail was known to live carefully, and was supposed to have saved a small sum of money. The gang, however, found on him only cheques, which he had got at the mine, and which could not he negotiated with safety. The condemned man, Arnglu. a Corsican, had originally been transported to New Caledonia; for life for the murder of his brother-in-law, and, as in many eases of this kind, he expiated his crime by twelve years’ hard labor. Santacroce, who received twenty years’ imprisonment for his participation in the crimes of the Red Band of the North, kept a sin all barber’s shop, but this appears to have been only a cloak to his misdeeds, as he harbored and fed the Arab. Zennani. the chief assassin of the gang. It was proved ■that Santacroce was the instigator or all the crimes. He was tried for receiving tIA stolen property. Originally he had beTn transported to tins colony for twenty years for a murder committed in France. ' ■ Grimi'Pii. who was sentenced to twenty years’ hard labor, is the son of an ex-convict, but seems to have borne a generally good! character, and in his district was fairly well respected, but his books showed that ho was unable to pay the debt contracted with h:s unfortunate victim, A incent.