CO129-393 - Governor Sir May - 1912 [11] — Page 199

COPY.

38975 Rece

9 DC12

Police Office,

8th. October, 1912.

191 180

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Hon. Colonial Secretary,

In continuation of the preliminary report which I

sent up on Saturday on the escape of Wong Cheuk from Gaol I now forward statements of the prison officers responsible for his safe custody on the night of Friday and early morning of Saturday last.

The prisoner had somehow obtained a piece of an old broken handle of a night-soil bucket. With this he loosened the bricks and made a hole just big enough for him to squeeze through (about 13 inches by 8) right through the outer wall of his cell. When the patrols came round he covered up the hole with the lid of his nightsoil bucket and resumed his place under his blanket and feigned sleep. He stored the loosened bricks, as he removed them, in the inner corner of the cell where they could not be seen from the outside. When the hole wES completed and he was ready to crawl through he arranged his blanket over the sand box, water tin and some bricks in such a way as to initate rather cleverly the appearance of a sleeping man. After he got out of the cell I believe he escaped by way of the roofs of the Police cells and into Arbuthnot Road.

The conclusion I draw is that the night orderly officer, Principal Warder Piesse, displayed gross carelessness and inattention, and is mainly responsible for the escape.

He admits that he made false entries of visits in the book in which such entries are recorded. He admits that he noticed the nightsoil bucket lid leaning against the midale of the outer wall, but says such a thing is not unusual and he did not regard it as suspicious. I am told that prisoners do sometimes leave the lid on the floor or against the wall after using their buckets (it will not be allowed in future) but I consider that in an important case like this P. W. Piesse displayed a grave error of judgment in not considering it suspicious. He denies Sher Singh's account of having called him from the adjudication room, but whether that part of Sher Singh's story is true or false P. W. Piesse says he visited the cell at 4.10 and the