Bsip Murderer

Now We're Quits

Unfit To Plead

A COURT in Honiara, BSIP, on October 9 declared a cook-boy who had been charged with the murder of a European, unfit to plead to the charge as he had insuf ficient intellect to follow proceed ings. He will be kept in custody at Her Majesty’s pleasure.

The cook-boy was a Rennelese, Ruel Tuata. His victim was a popular, 27-years-old Australian, Frederick Neil Gilliland, of the BSIP Treasury for the last two years and, before that, of the British Administration in the New Hebrides. He was attacked with a knife in his house on August 7 and died from wounds.

The verdict has caused a couple of raised eyebrows, and the case some speculation in view of the fact that Reginald Poole, who murdered a native boy in BSIP a couple of years ago, was committed to an in stitution for the criminally insane in the UK. (See PIM, Sept., p. 25.) Many BSIP residents thought he should have been hanged to show the law was not one sided.

In view of the circumstances, the discovery that Ruel Tuata is weak in intellect, is very fortunate.