The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-10-10


 New Facts Startling
 Yet, even as the sexton in the Wood- lawn cemetery yesterday afternoon at 3 o'clock was filling the grave of Mrs. Wil- lis Naftel facts startling and mysterious, were brought to the notice of Coroner Brasher in his office in the courthouse facts which reopened the case and which started the investigation which Is at present under way by the civil author ities.
 Officials yesterday morning grudgingly gave out the facts for publication. Accord ing to their importance or bearing upon the case in its present stage, they are given below, although the names of sev- eral people have been linked with the mystery as witnesses or as third party, were withheld.
 At $40 o'clock Tuesday morning two women, just awakened from their sleep. peered through their bedroom windows and saw and heard huge automobile touring car flash past their respective houses. The machine came out of the gate of the Woodlawn cemetery at Fifty second street. It was going at high speed and contained one lone passen- ger a man whose face was muffled in a high collared ulster and who was at the and carried it's license tax in the rear. The two women were unable to make out the number on the tag.
 Bodies Found
 Twenty minutes later Sexton H. J. Newborne. going to his days work in the cemetery, found the bodies of the dead man and woman. The woman, ly- ing on the ground at full length, lay with her face turned upwards It wore smile, frozen in death, and was black ened until almost resembling d negro. The man, with his head lying on the right side of the womans breast, also wore a smile, but his face still held it's natural color.
 Coroner Brasher and physicians who examined the bodies following their removal to the undertaking parlors at woodlawn. held that the woman had evidently been dead for over eight hours, and that the blackened counten- ance was the natural result of this ex- posture after death. The only deduc- ton that could explain the striking contrast between their colors was that the man had been dead only a short time, probably even less than an hour.
 When two undertakers, the graveyard sexton and a physician viewed the bodies of MT. and Mrs. T. O. Naftel ly-
 on the grass surrounding the grave of Lwellelyn w.. Johns about 20 min utes after they were discovered. the position of the revolver in the dead mans hand was carefully noted. The pistol, S2-calibre Iver Johnson type, Hay with its barrel end protruding into the grass, while the butt lay touching the half opened hand
 Gun Not Rusted
 At the time of this careful study the sun had been blazing with early morn ing heat for over an hour and half, and the grass which had been wet with dew from the night was dry. If Naftel had killed himslef immediately follow ing the death of his wife. which. ac- cording to the physicians, had been al HOSl tlSDl oiiu e'ic ANF'A yer loosed from the dead hand. had slipped into that position at that time, the end of the barrel would have been rusted. When it was found the bar irel of shining nickel plate was un- lblemished.
 The deductions drawn from these facts and other minor bits of evidence. Eall lead toward one central point, that Naftel killed his wife Monday evening. that he later met and parleyed with a third party, whom he possibly attacked thinking he had been discovered, that he, himself, was shot and killed with his own pistol by this third party at some time past o'clock Tuesday morn ing, and that the r3volver was laid in his hand; that this third party was none other than the man seen by the two women in the strange machine at l5:40 o'clock coming from the ceme- tery: and that the tradegy. rather than a homicide and suicide, was a double murder. deliberate and premeditated. Just what will be the actions of Coro- ner Brasher and other authorities fol : lowing these disclosures is not known. As a thorough inquest and examination was held Tuesday morning and the position and style of. the gun wounds which caused the death of Naftel and his wife were carefully noted. it6 is believed that the bodies will not be ex- lhumed. Yesterdays developments were perplexing and caused some uneasi- ness, and the investigation will be pushed rapidly.