Before returning his verdict, Mr. Haines stated that he had been forced to the conclusion that the shooting had not been an accident and he was strengthened in this opinion by the evidence of Dr. Anderson. The revolver, he said, had been wrongfully detained by deceased when it should have been returned to the stores.
It might have been that a round had been left in the revolver and deceased had accidentally shot himself but, against this, was the path of the bullet through the head, which showed that revolver was held downwards and that it must have been touching the skin.
One thing he did not understand was the fact that the deceased had found it necessary while cleaning the revolver to take out a case of ammunition and place it close by. He would not have taken the ammunition from the officer's equipment if he had been going only to clean the revolver. The fact that the revolver had touched the skin seemed to wipe out the accident theory.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.