C. Roy ReynoldsCONTINUING THE description of the murder discovery at 16 South Camp Road on the morning of February 1935 The Gleaner said: "On the floor of the bathroom another figure of a man, swollen in the same proportion, lay face down, hands tied behind him a cloth as stiff as a drum under the strain of decaying and expanding flesh across his mouth".
But most sickening, it continued, were the knife wounds "and the black clamminess of congealed blood that covered the floor from Monday night until yesterday. These two silent figures that were once men had kept each other's company, alike in the warmth of daylight as in the cold silence of the mid-winter nights."
The police who had handled matters so casually and reluctantly, were faced with a murder scene that had gone cold and perpetrators who had almost a week to put distance between themselves and their pursuers. And thus it was that instead of detecting a crime in progress the police had allowed their opportunity to slip and were to become involved in a long and costly international search.
The Gleaner reported that the first police officer on the scene was Inspector Higgins.
DMO for Kingston Dr. R.H. Davidson was summoned. After a preliminary examination he ordered the two bodies carted off in a big box to the mortuary. According to the newspaper the only clues found in the house were a bottle of rum and the cover of an old leather briefcase with the name A. Pollen scratched on it.
Further investigation established that the bigger of the two murdered men was that of Aurelio Pollen who had stayed at a lodging house run by a Mr. Hernandez at 23 Charles Street since arriving in the island on January 25. Hernandez told The Gleaner that he understood that Pollen was a merchant from Havana and since his arrival had been receiving substantial sums of money by drafts. On the Monday morning of the murders he had gone to the bank, cashed the drafts and announced he was off to the country to buy cattle.
The other victim was identified as Francis Gomez. He was reported to have been a frequent visitor to Pollen. They were reported to have gone out together. A third man whom nobody had seen recently was also reported to have received substantial sums of money from Cuba through Pollen.
A search of Pollen's luggage left at the lodging revealed, according to The Gleaner, only matters of a domestic nature. One item that attracted curiosity was a letter from a woman in Sweden reminiscing romantically on the times that they had together during what she described as "the troubles" in Cuba. The third man who had seemingly disappeared was identified as one Mr. Maspon whom The Gleaner asserted that it had learned from "a reliable quarter" that late in the day of the murders had visited the office of Pan American Airways demanding a seat on a plane "going north the next day". He had arrived in a taxi without luggage, and had on only a slipper on his feet. He was informed that the flight had been heavily booked but that they would do what they could for him. In anticipation of a seat becoming available he was weighed and tipped the scale at 170 pounds. Asked why he was in such a hurry to leave he said his father was dangerously ill in Santa Clara, Cuba. Contacted by the authorities Pan American denied any knowledge of any such situation. But according to The Gleaner, it had reliable information that Maspon had been getting on the plane the next morning without any luggage.
That just deepened the mystery and it appeared to deepen still more when The Gleaner reported what could possibly be a political connection. According to this report on the Sunday before the murders a Kingston businessman had remarked at a beach that "the only man who can run Cuba properly is Machado". This sparked a heated argument in Spanish between the businessman and two other men who administered a beating to the businessman. And the source said one of the attackers bore a resemblance to the victim named Gomez.
Still, The Gleaner speculated that "whatever the motive of the murderers the affair has no connection with Jamaica except that this island was chosen by chance or design as the scene for the tragic drama. It speculated that the manner of the stab wounds suggested that the murderers not only wanted to kill the victims but to torture them.
The Cuban Consulate in Jamaica was called in and took possession of most of victim Pollen's belongings which were not retained by the police as forensically useful in the investigation. An investigation that was just in its infancy.
C. Roy Reynolds is a freelance journalist.
