Resident Commissioner

Brutal Murder of Niue Is.

AFTER a five-day search by virtu ally the entire male population of Niue Island, three men were apprehended on August 20 for the alleged murder of Mr. C. H. W.

Larsen, Resident Commissioner of the island.

Mr. Larsen was murdered while sleeping in his bed on the night of Saturday, August 15, and his wife was seriously injured with cuts about the head and with a double fracture of an arm.

It is believed that the murderers attacked the Larsens with a machete and that they had escaped from a prison farm which is near the Re sidency.

Two of the Larsen children, Billy, aged nine, and Telma, aged 17, were not harmed. Telma’s twin sister is at a Teachers’ Training College in New Zealand.

Although Niue is very isolated— about 300 miles from the Tongan Group, its nearest neighbour—and only about 100 square miles in ex tent, it is in parts very heavily wooded and rugged. The search for the suspected murderers obvi ously presented problems but their eventual capture was inevitable; their only real escape could be by sea.

No motive for the crime has been suggested. The Larsens moved into the new Residency at the beginning of this year, it is very isolated and about a mile from the old Residency which was right in Alofi, the chief township of the island and the port of entry. * The assistant-secretary of the NZ territories Department was at Niue on a routine visit just before the tragedy and slept at the Residency b^ Mr - Larsen was had left that same day on the Tofua.

Mr. Larsen was born in New Zea land in 1908 and entered the Terri tories Department in 1928. He served Si«S rious J c ? pacities in the Cook Islands and Western Samoa before he was appointed Resident Com missioner at Niue at the end of 1943. He was regarded by his fellow °S™ rs « an extremely efficient abt C v r hnf He had a likeable person alty but was a man of very firm for wh ° knew what he wanted for Niue and saw that he got it b? ?hp W M- not alwa y s appreciated by the Nieueans, and in his earlv to ai th? S m ° th l y S i ent three petitions asking Zealand Government asxing that he be removed. in Th pb^ Ue f nati J es differ somewhat in character from other Polv- S ans -They are noted as hard jnd industrious workers and ° f i hem so as labourers to ♦ and New Zealand. At home they turn out large quantities of

baskets, hats and mats for export.

When news of the murder became known in Western Samoa, two In spectors of the local Police Force left in a small chartered motor vessel for Niue. A party from New Zealand consisting of Mr. L. G. H. Sinclair, SM, who will hear the case; Crown Prosecutor Mr. H. R. c. Wild of Wellington: defence counsel Mr Peasants, of Auckland, with Mr. C. E. Quin, Asst. Sec. of Island Territories, arrived in Niue for the trial of the three accused in earlv September. J NIUE IS., Sept. 9: The three accused were found guilty and sentenced to hang on Niue. Mrs Larsen her two children and legal P ar ty left the island immediately after the trial by Tofua. y