The Police initially had Len Demler as their prime suspect. English author David Yallop agreed and wrote that “the man in the target sights of Hutton’s gun was Len Demler” and Taupo author Chris Birt was equally confident in 2001 that Len was the killer . . .
The 2014 Police Review explained at length the early belief of investigators that Demler was the murderer. If Len was the brutal murderer of two people, one being his own daughter, then one must ask why the police were reluctant to take any action even after Arthur Thomas was pardoned.
The Police initially had Len Demler as their prime suspect. English author David Yallop agreed and wrote that “the man in the target sights of Hutton’s gun was Len Demler” and Taupo author Chris Birt was equally confident in 2001 that Len was the killer . . .
The 2014 Police Review explained at length the early belief of investigators that Demler was the murderer. If Len was the brutal murderer of two people, one being his own daughter, then one must ask why the Police were reluctant to take any action even after Arthur Thomas was pardoned.
Perhaps Len wasn’t the culprit. Maybe he wasn’t the one to pull the trigger but in most people’s minds, including mine, he was most definitely involved at some stage during the five days before the Crewes were reported missing.
I believe Len Demler most certainly had motive. To me, like others, his manner and behaviour when under pressure of being interviewed by Bruce Hutton (the officer in charge of the Crewe inquiry) to me shows the man’s line of intelligence and cunning. When interviewed, Len danced all around the subject, a ploy that let the other person do all the talking.
His most common response was to answer a question with a question, such as, “You think I used the wheelbarrow to shift the bodies” which led the interviewer to give an opinion to which Len may give another neat and short answer, “that is right” or “I can’t remember”.
Studying these things over time I have come to the conclusion that if Len Demler made any comment on any subject in this case you could be sure he knew he was on solid ground and could not be proved wrong. Simply because to his way of thinking if he had no part in that particular part of crime there was nothing to worry about even if it didn’t work with Arthur Allan Thomas! In Len’s mind all he had to do was keep quiet and say nothing although his “don’t care” attitude didn’t help.
DEMLER RELATIONSHIPS
Chris Birt gave a very interesting background summary of the “intricacies of the relationships within the Demler family” in his 2001 book The Final Chapter. I quote the following paragraphs:
“May Constance Chennells was born at St Leonard’s on Sea, England, in 1906, three years before her future husband was born at Taihape, in the hill country immediately south of the mountains of the central North Island of New Zealand. Her parents brought her to New Zealand soon after, moving into the Pukekawa area in the early 1920s.
“Subsequently they sent their only daughter to St Cuthbert’s, the exclusive Auckland school reputed to turn out young ladies of strong moral fibre. In later years, this was to be the school selected for attendance by Jeannette and Heather Demler as they also passed into adolescence, and much later, by Rochelle, then firmly in the care of her aunt.
“Maisey [sic] Chennells was a woman of the old school, a morally upstanding member of the Pukekawa district and a devout supporter of the local Anglican Church, as indeed her parents had been in an era still dominated by the British Queen, Victoria. On the face of it, Maisey’s marriage to Len Demler could be considered an unusual match.
“On one hand, the daughter of a wealthy farming family, remnants of the well-to-do English aristocracy, who had travelled halfway round the world for a new life in a far-flung outpost of the Empire. On the other was the forever–smiling, somewhat oddball son of a businessman turned farmer who went to the Pukekawa district to eke out a living from the scrub-covered hill country.
“But the answer to that seemingly unusual union may be found in the certificate which records the marriage of the two at St Andrew’s Church, Pukekohe, on 7 October 1936. At that time, Maisey Chennells was 30. Her status on that certificate is recorded as spinster, perhaps a worrying position for a well-to-do old English family such as the Chennells.
“No one of course can claim that this was a marriage born of desperation, but with an unwed daughter of 30 still on their hands, the Chennells may well have considered that the young Len Demler was a better bet than no bet, even if knowledge of his German blood and memories of the horrors of the Great War were still vivid at that time.
“In any event, May Chennells became May Demler and the newly married couple moved on to the block next door to her parents–a farm that was ultimately to provide the final split for the Demlers, in every sense of the word. If there was discord in the marriage, it could only have been exacerbated by the actions of Demler himself in defrauding the Inland Revenue Department, and by his general uncouthness and surly behaviour which was well known to family friends–as recorded in statements given to the Police later.”
LEN PURCHASES SECTION 2
I will talk more about the tax department later but at this stage Len was settling down with his new wife Maisie on land that he had procured from Charles Edward Wheeler during April 1936, about six months before his marriage to Maisie.
The date when Len actually “purchased” his property is unclear as according to the Certificate of Title for Section 2 Block XIII Maramarua SD, Wheeler held the balance of payment until the date of transfer to Len Demler on 26 August 1956, 20 years later. The title shows Wheeler having discharged his own mortgage on 14 April 1936 so it seems apparent that Len entered into some form of agreement with Wheeler, such as taking up a lease with the right to buy.
How Len Demler ended up finding his own property to farm came about through what appeared to be a major disagreement with his father William, during a period where the young Lenard was put to hard labour for many years helping his father break in a farm at Opuatia.
ABOUT WILLIAM DEMLER
The first clue Birt gave me in finding more about William Demler was on page 29 of The Final Chapter where he said the Demler family already had their own home in Auckland city before buying the Opuatia property.
A search through some early directories uncovered some interesting facts. Cleaves Auckland Provincial Directory of 1920/21 lists William Demler as a farmer of Mt St John Ave, an address that turned out to be close to Market Road, Epsom.
The 1925 and 1929 NZ Post Office directories show a change of address and occupation. He is listed here as a taxi driver of 76 Market Road only a short distance from his previous address.
It is interesting to look at the history of this developing area. Initially large country houses and farms dotted the landscape but from the 1890s onwards suburban development spread southwards from Newmarket across the fields of Epsom. From this statement it can be established that owners farming this area were ‘on to a winner’. It can be imagined that the price of land rapidly skyrocketed with William Demler being in the box seat. His change of occupation and address indicates that he ceased being a farmer and took up taxi driving.
History also shows that most of the housing in the area dates from 1900 to 1930, often large houses built solidly of wood, many in the Californian Bungalow or “Stockbroker Tudor” styles. The house situated at 76 Market Road confirms this statement and suggests William Demler was not short of “readies”.
The entry in the 1938 NZ Post Office directory says William Demler was a farmer of 76 Market Rd and also farmer of Opuatia. From this information it can be reasoned that William and his wife Annie were based in Auckland while developing the farm at Opuatia. The missing directories between 1929 and 1938 (that I don’t have access to) would indicate when the farm was purchased.
TAMING THE LAND
Chris Birt writes that William Demler took over 400 hectares of desolate, broken country in 1931 that he simply described as being “on the western boundary of the Thomas farm” in the Pukekawa district. For the benefit of the reader, Birt is referring to information he gathered from Allan Thomas, father of pardoned murderer Arthur Alan Thomas and other members of the Thomas family.
As far as I could discover, the Thomas family had two farms in the area at separate times, the second being the one farmed at the time of the murders on Mercer Ferry Road and the other, on a much earlier location south of Opuatia.
Despite prolonged searches through land records I was unable to discover exactly where the first Thomas farm was located and I thought once that was identified would lead on to finding where William Demler had his farm.
After several meetings with Birt and once with the Thomases (namely Des, Ray and Richard) all were reluctant to enlighten me, in fact they clammed up and changed the subject many times.
They were deliberately not answering the question and to my mind they were probably wanting to hide the fact that their father was only leasing land otherwise the Thomas name would have appeared somewhere on a certificate of title. Most likely the same applied to William Demler as well.
Perhaps finding this information is not of real importance so in the interests of continuing, Birt simply says William Demler “built his first cottage there assisted by his decidedly unenthusiastic son, Lenard.”
He continues: “Then followed the back-breaking task of taming the scrub-covered land” and “armed with the Aryan psyche which led a nation to take on the world not once but twice in the space of 30 years, and the first crawler tractor the Thomases had ever seen, Demler and his son attacked the easy country first, leaving the more difficult terrain till last. Demler senior toiled tirelessly–he was a real worker and required the same of his son, the only male amid four girls.”
Apparently the work pace set by the Demlers was known throughout the district. “The older Demler would walk through the bush for two hours and be ready to start work in the middle of nowhere at dawn. He’d slash and burn all day and would get home well after dark. It was seven-day-a-week work, with little respite for either father or son.”
CHIP ON SHOULDER
William Demler was obviously a hard taskmaster but it was to later affect his son’s attitude towards his father and to life in general. Some people could be excused for thinking that Len was starting to build a chip on his shoulder which over the years was to grow larger.
Birt continues and says that when Len Demler moved to his own farm in 1936, it being pretty much a re-run of his earlier days. “Almost 190 hectares of scrub-covered land stood before him, the second major land-clearing job he had been required to undertake in his short life.”
The Thomases also recalled the bitterness with which Len had completed his first stint of hard labour for his father. “Still close to him at that time, they were aware that the young man believed he was in line for his father’s property and was more than a little disillusioned when that didn’t happen. As a consequence, Demler junior was quite open about his intention to hit his ‘old man’ up for £1000 for all he had done over those years.”
Birt writes that the Thomases believe he got the money, “but that this was all the return he received for what had seemed like a lifetime of toil, blood, sweat and tears.”
When Len Demler moved to his own farm, just over the boundary fence from his future parents-in-law, Birt says he developed an open determination to hold on to what he had acquired.
“As development there continued, and the years passed by, that 190-hectare holding became Demler’s kingdom. He worked hard improving it. Like his father before him, he was a tireless worker and as a consequence few, even in his immediate neighbourhood, saw much of him during that time.”
PASSING OF WILLIAM DEMLER
Len Demler’s father, William, passed away on 2 December 1975, a good five years after the double murder and on reading his last Will and Testament, it became clear that Len did eventually benefit from his father’s estate.
The dollar amount is not known but William Demler’s estate was split five ways with all children receiving equal shares (see extract below). Some of the detail is in Clause 7 (overleaf) where it lists investments that “may be of terminable or wasting nature or may consist of freehold tenanted property or shares in a limited liability company.” He goes on to state that the yearly produce of such investments shall be treated as income. Without a Certificate of Title we still do not know exactly where William Demler’s Opuatia farm was once located.
I now move on to the next generations.
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