ANOTHER ALLEGED CONFESSION THAT HE IS THE RIPPER
THE CANARY BIRD MAY HANG HIM
Melbourne, April 29.
The Standard says it is in a position to announce without reserve that Deeming has confessed to his lawyers and the doctors who examined him that he committed the majority of the Jack the Ripper crimes in the Whitechapel district of London. The article has created a great sensation. The demeanor of Deeming when he was arraigned for trial in the central criminal court presented a marked difference from his conduct at the inquest. He was quiet and depressed, and he looked very much disappointed when the judge decided that the trial should at once be proceeded with.
After the jury had been selected the public prosecutor began his speech, in which he arrayed with almost irresistible force all the facts in connection with the murder of the prisoner's wife. Deeming had put aside the flippant air that characterized him at the previous hearings, and he listened closely to the prosecutor's speech.
The taking of testimony was then begun. Connor, the agent, testified to letting the house to Deeming and the discovery of the crime. The witness noticed a terrible smell in the bedroom and the police having been summoned the hearthstone was taken up, with the result already known. He identified the prisoner as Deeming.
Police Sergeant Loghlin swore to discovering the body of the deceased encased in cement and lying in a hole beneath the hearthstone. Mr. Oakes, who was a passenger with the prisoner and his wife on board the Kaiser Wilhelm II, during the outward voyage in December last, said he had identified the remains as those of Mrs. Williams. Williams seemed very kind and affectionate to his wife during the voyage. He identified the prisoner as the man he had known as the husband of the deceased.
Evan Williams, a policeman from western Australia, gave evidence as to the prisoner's arrest at Southern Cross. He placed his hands on the prisoner's shoulders and said to he: "I arrest you for the murder of Emily Williams at Windsor." The prisoner replied: "I don't know anything about it. I never was at Windsor, to my knowledge. I am innocent."
At Albany the prisoner was placed in the lockup in the charge of two constables. During the night he contrived to remove his mustache. No one could explain how. Numerous witnesses testified to seeing Deeming buy a shovel, cement and sand, and to hearing sounds of pounding in the house, made while Deeming was burying his victim under the cement.
A curious feature of the courtroom was the presence of the canary bird which had belonged to the murdered Emily Mather Deeming and which the prisoner had taken with him after the murder. By means of this canary bird and its cage the prisoner had been traced from place to place, and it had thus been largely instrumental in bringing him to justice.
London, April 29.
The correspondent of the International Telegram company had an interview with Albert and Alfred Deeming as to the allegations that their brother showed signs of insanity in his boyhood and that insanity had been common in the Deeming family. Both indignantly denied that any member of the family had ever been in an asylum. Albert Deeming said:
"The story that our brother was even queer in his youth is bosh and nonsense. He was never called Mad Fred, that is a mere fabrication to suit the present emergency. It is ridiculous to slander our father and mother by saying that they were regarded even as eccentric."
Alfred Deeming said:
"Our brother was not even especially tricky or mischievous. He was a commonplace boy, and all this talk about instinctive insanity is due to the efforts of his counsel to get him released. The whole story is imaginary, and we wish people to understand that we do not countenance it."
London, April 29.
The Scotland yard authorities, in view of the Melbourne Standard story, again assert positively that Deeming could not have committed the Ripper murders.
