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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Seaforth News, 1955-12-22, Page 6PLYPAPER POISONER KILLED F %'P PROFIT Over a period of eighteen years mysterious deaths were contin- ually occurring in a country dis- triet called "Tisza Corner," near Budapest. The victims, mostly innocent people, always died in agony. A cold-blooded mass -poisoner was at work. Everyone knew her identity -- yet Madame Julius Fazekas was allowed to carry on her terrible trade until more than fifty people had met their deaths at her hands, The key to her power lay in the fact that many local people . had paid her and her assistants to break the law for them them — and even get rid of unwanted relatives. They were terrified of being implicated. Another extraordinary feature was the odd reluctance of both local and regional authorities to snake more than superficial in- vestigations when their sus eicions were aroused by the ar- rival of anonymous letters. Madame Fazekas lived in the village of Nagyrev, which, with a few hamlets and one other village named Tiszakurt, com- prised the area known by a loop of the river Tisza. A widow, she was a midwife by profession. Greedy for money, she showed criminal tendencies while still a young woman. Finding that the fees earned by normal midwifery were too small to satisfy her desires for clothes and jewellery, she turn- ed her attention to illegal open• ations. That was in 1900. Six ;years later the first great war began, and Madame Fazekas soon found j at hand all the circumstances which could make her illegal oc• eupation lucrative. For, as the war dragged on, so more and more husbands and male sweethearts were called up, and prisoners -of -war began to arrive; And the womenfolk. de- prived of their husbands and sweethearts, found the P.O.W 's engaged in agricultural work more than ready to take the place Of the absent men. Under these conditions Mad- ame Fazekas, working on the credulity of the simple village Women, was soon making a lot of money at her vile trade Meanwhile, another midwife had set herself up in opposition To the avaricous Madame Faze- kas this was a barefaced attempt to steal her livelihood Cunning. [y, she set about removine this :menace. She became the sweet- heart of the woman's brother, and not long afterwards, by ap- parent coincidence, her rival died a sudden violent death! The neighbours. and especial- ly the woman's grown-up son, were certain she had been pois- tined by Madame Fazekas, but Only the son had the courage to do anything about it. He chal- lenged Madame Fazekas with the murder, Brazenly, she dared him to prove it. Outwitting the vengeful soil was not very difficult. Madame Fazekas visited a number of people whom she had "helped." and thus formed a gang who let it be known that they were prepared to burn down the house Of anyone who gave evidence against her. It was natural enough, then, that the villagers of Nagyrev should pretend they knew noth- ing when the son sought con- firmation of his belief. Thwarted, he waylaid Madame Fazekas one day, shot at her — and missed. The penalty for the attempt was a long term of im- prisonment, an act of fate which removed Madame Fazekas' great- est enemy. The ease with which these two enemies had been removed tempt- ed Madame Fazekas to offer her "services" to other people also desirous of getting rid of some. body. Almost openly she let it be known what it would cost, and she arranged a scale of fees which Varied according to the wealth and social position of the inter- ested persons. Subsequent investigations sug- gest that the first "murder for profit" took place in 1916. The victim was a fairly wealthy man. When he fell genuinely ill, his wife (wishing to be rid of Weil obtained Madame Fazekas' help to ensure that he didn't recover Arsenic, supplied by Madame Fazekas, was added to his medi- cine, Ironically, the guilty pair Ind the bottle of arsenic -contaminat- ed medicine in the victim's coffin, never foreseeing that the body would be exhumed and the grisly evidence revealed nineteen years later. During the period 1918-1924, many people died "mysterious - Iv" in the villages of Nagyrev and Tiszakurt. But few had any doubts as to the identities of the murderers. Then, in 1924, the suspicions of a local doctor became crystal- lized by the sudden death of a wealthy patient whom he has been treating for "bronchitis." The illness was not serious so that the doctor was startled when, about a week later, the wile visited him at his surgery, said her husband had died in the night, and requested a -death certificate, The doctor went immediately and examined the body. Unable to ascertain the cause of death, he submitted a request for en autopsy to the local attorney, But, since it was based on sus- picion only, the request was re- fused. Later that year the first of the anonymous letters arrived. One reached the authorities at Nagy - rev in which it was clearly stated that people were being put to death by poison; both victims and murderers were clearly named. But, oddly enough, the letter was ignored. Four years later a woman's body was recovered from the river Tisza, An autopsy proved she had died of arsenic poisoning Police investigations were made easy when the woman's daughter confessed. She was sentenced to life imprisonment• but this was later commuted to penal servitude. Yet Madame Fazekas was still not implicated. Then came another anonymous letter, which was delivered to the Lomb prosecutor. He ignored it. In 1929 a third anonymous letter arrived, this time address- ed to the Attorney -General at Szolnok. In it the writer directly accused three women of poison- ing people. The writer was iden- THEY FIGHT, FILM FiRM BUSTS—Because sultry Italian movie stars Sophia Loren, left, and Silvana Mangano battled over which would stat in a picture about Indochina, Italy's biggest moviecompany has broken up. It was the Ponti-De Laurentis Film Co. Carlo Ponti, 42, the steady date of Sophia, 20, in- sisted that she get the stellar role. But his partner, Dino De Laurentis, happens to be Silvana's husband, and was deter- mined that his wife get the plum. So Ponti and Sophia went one way and De Laurentis and his Silvana the other. Both sides Ara racing to be the first to produce the Indochina film. No Dirk Ever Had Too 1 tiany Clothes To Wear This fact may be the key to the puzzle of what to do with Uncle Sam's huge, 23 -million bale, two-year surplus of American -grown cotton. Comely government girls recently mo- deled clothing fashioned from cotton and cotton blends at the Department of Agriculture's Beltsville, Md., Experiment Station, Products of both government and textile mill research, new types of cloth are, or will soon be, in the market. Some of the styles are shown, below. Cotton and China grass, fiber of the ramie plant, is com- bined in this attractive two- piece suit for casual wear. Bathing suit and coat feature first practical u s e of corn grain thread. It's blended with wool and cotton when woven. Cotton -fabric raincoat h a s woven - in reflective thread which turns wearer into a walking danger sign at night. tified, and failing to produce evi- dence to support his accusations, was promptly sent to prison for slander! Despite this, frightened people in the village concerned contin• sed to write many anonymous letters. And, at last, a thorough investigation was launched by the authorities. A number of bodies were ex- humed and arsenic was found in them. Police inquiries quickly broke down the wall of feat which had so strangely protected the guilty, and several people confessed. The evidence against Madame Fazekas piled up so quickly that she was on the point of being arrested when she took her own life. Altogether, twenty-nine bodies were exhumed, involving eighty- six cases in the village of Nagy - rev alone. Something over forty people from both villages were implicated in the murders. After a long and sensational trial, six were found guilty and sentenced to death, seven receiv- ed life imprisomnent and an- other seven were sentenced to periods ranging from five to fif- teen years In her diabolical "trade" Madame Fazekas was assisted by two women friends. To obtain the arsenic, they used flypapers — so many that at the trial a grocer from a neighbouring town was able to testify that more fiv- papers were sold in Nagyrev than in all the rest of Hungary. From these the arsenic wasextracted and mixed with the food, drink or medicine of the chosen victim. Murder Gomes Out In The Wash! A young man leaves I,ie at the cleaner's saying he be back for it next day. T. -:e assistant preparing the for cleaning notices a stain ,a: the cuff. There has 1•Je-,r, a nasty brawl in the dictrie'. which a youth was stableee. Before the suit is cieane-s lees stain is tested. In this ca:'- titrns out pot Ie. be blood. end the. suit is handed Leek r:1eer.r.d without the young man having the least idea of the int'-,', t it has aroused. Even if the slain hadI turn -d out to be blood. probably no- thing would have been said. But the police might have made a routine check on the young main just to make sure before the stain was removed and the pos- sible flue obliterate_d,- • In fact, although cleaning would make the stain invisible, it would probably not conceal from the microscopes, lamps and chemicals of the modern laboratory elelective the fact that there had been blood on the cloth,Modern techniques have reached the point where invisible amounts of ehemieals can be identified. - A bullet passing through a piece of clothing leaves behind tiny pieces of metal rubbed from it by friction. They are touch too small to the visible to the naked eye or even under a microscope. Boat delicate lest:, with the spectrograph mac LONDON DERRIERE — Backseat. driver goes for a stroll with his mother in London, England, in this 20th Century adoption of the "papoose caboose" — cen- turies-old method of toting the baby. , show them, and prove that the hole was not made by a knife or by accidentally tearing. • It a bullet is fired from a Shutt dt + r _ there will he mi >nc ne of powder imbed- ded el,': Teete exist makii.g peessibie to lied each greise The petite: thee make s : , :. ui tanee f.*o . fired. r.formation •'5:.': ,: a,:.tante, it fired :r, a :struggle Ir. ' ,etis,. m ar.,^hor elothes %:ar. provider ke7,. sluein almost any 's,n's. f'rn ?t.i r' -anon po- luse ail over the :a:rrkl geek the r,-ope3ation ,f r..vei,y(ne who cars,:art s d a, the making and x 'pairing ,f girth and clothes— doth n:,r.ufaatar .r . dyers, larrnrir:ret'. Ir: riimr tr-,iir r, .peed tc neural:'; n rrythin . The Iden- tification of a l,undry mark within an hour ,r two of a body heirs; found, for instance, may inereese the r•hanees of finding the killer one hundred per cent against its ideriiification a week .later. Laundry mark:• have been vital slurs in the identification of a number of murder victims. Where detectives examined the clothes of a body in a trunk at Charing Cross cloak -room they found the name "P. Holt" and a laundry mark. The mark led them to a Miss Holt, who identified the gar- ment as one she had passed to a cook who had left her service. The cook's husband was traced -anal the• body identified. The woman's associates were traced. When an early morning bath- er found the body of a woman who had been strangled with a bootlace on Yarmouth sands, there was no •clue to her iden- tity. except the laundry num; ber 599 on her linen. • A. photograph of that number was identified by it laundry far away in fent as the one they noel allotted to a fsee te-nneti, of Ectlnyherilh, and inch was the beginning of the end for her husband who had murdered her. Laundry marks "wanted" tor identification are periodically published in the trade press, not necessarily, of coarse, in con-, nection with murder. They may be Blues t0 persons found dead or wandering. The clever crook in these clays may be aware of the danger of laundry marks and examine cloth carefully for them, perhap- titting thein 0111, 13tit au itioreasiug nttntl.tcr of latuutrie.s- nos': use"itn•is- iblc" marks. TO, save ugly marking the int: used is invis- ible except under e,- special lamp. ?loreovcr, ronin<„ 0511 marks and tailor's or clean- er's tabs does non mean a Niece of cloth cannot be iden- tified. by the tnuclern scientific detective. .A piece of gauze little more than tine sire of a half-crown, bloodstained and dirty, was foutuci near the body of 0 mur- dered girl. It seemed the only material clue. and. it might - have come from auvwhere. But the experts But to work and identified the gauze as a type used by a particular manufacturer in s u r g,. i c a 1 dreseiiiif5. The trail then led to an Army camp, and finally to a soldier 1 tvho had used Isis field dressing to bandage an injured thumb. Part of the remainder of the dressing was recovered, and ex- perts from a civilian textile laboratory were able to show the fragment and the remaind- er `matched." Individual manufacturer's' methods of spinning and weav- ing, the dye and other factors make it possible to trace a mere fragment of cloth back to its makers and then perhaps to a particular shop. 8tven a few fibres, almost in- visible to the naked eye, per- haps under the fingernails of ro person who has been attacked, or on the wing of a car or thu zagged edge of a broken safe, may be identified and eventual. 1y proved to have come frons+ a particular jacket. Cleaning may provide inval- uable clues in another way. Mt kinds of textiles are liable to pick up and hold minute parti- cles, The amount is increased when they are made up intsi clothes because they are re- tained in the crevices of pockets and seams. It is almost routine now for the last particle to be extract- ed from the clothes of a suspect f o r laboratory examination. Minute fragments may be iden- tified as 'paint and proved t0 snatch the paint on a blasted sate, A cast -.iron alibi of a suspect in a murder case in New York was broken when dust from hie cuffs was examined in the lab- oratory. It included almost in- visible particles of earth and dead plants. The body had been found in Central Park, The fragments exactly matched the earth and dead weeds under it. That "dust" resulted in the man with the alibi being coag- victed and duly executed, Short Skirts Make News and Trouble Skirts constantly make news. Because he disapproved of hiss fiancee's frock, a twenty -year- old Surrey soldier cut it with a razor. When charged with injuring the girl and damaging her frock, he said her skirt was much tort short. He was bound over and ordered to pay for the damage. A new law prohibiting short, skirts was introduced in Athens in 1926 and rigorously enforced. A pretty young girl was arrest- ed because her skirt was 15 in. from the ground. Police said it should not have been more than 14 in. from the ground, but the girl was allowed to go free al- ter twenty-four hours. Less than a week later the law was cancelled following the arrest of another girl She pro4•ed to •be the dainty, twen- ty - year - old daughter of a Greek judge. She had been jailed for a day for walking down the street in an "immod- est" skirt more than 14 in. front the ground. Lovely Spanish girls flatly refused to obey a decree by the Mayor of Almendralejo, a town in province of Badajoz, which forbade women to wear very short skirts in 1927. Instead, they paid fines en- titling them to wear a short skirt for one month. Police with tape -measures were empowered • to measure in the street skirts of debatable length. Eventually that decree was cancelled, too. You can fall foul of the law for some strange things in dif- ferent parts of the world. An Indian girl was sentenced to a month's hard labour at New Delhi for kissing her sweetheart in a quiet alley. The youth was fined $20, DRIVE WITH CARE SQUEEZE 1- — This huge closed .die forging press, biggest Indus- trial machine ever built, stands imposingly in an aircraft plant,. Ten stories high and boasting a 50,000 -ton "squeezing" power, the giant press is turning out airplane parts. It tock 17 months to assemble the press, which weighs 10,605 tons. coma 48 Feet above the operating Floor and more the, 60 F rt bow it, the press is suspended in a 100-foot-dsep r.'1,