The series

H1949 Eileen Jones, July 1942 Govind Ranchhod, April Lee Hoy Chong, May 1950 Stephen and Peter Wingrove, December 1949 Alan Jacques, July 1955, Sharon Skiffington, March 1955 worth about $200 today).

“The Chinaman was not moving but was breathing very heavily and was sort of snoring. I saw blood all around the floor by the Chinaman’s head, but I did not know that he had been wounded until afterward.”

O’Rourke told Malcolm Lee was “only unconscious” and would be “all right in half an hour”.

He was found dead the next day by a visitor.

Lee had offered to sell his opium at £25 a pound (about $3960 a kg today) but was told it was poor quality and no one would buy it.

O’Rourke thought it was worth far more than that. In the days after Lee’s death he, accompanied by others, tried unsuccessfully to sell it on an opium tour of the provinces — two trips to Hamilton, one of which carried on to Tirau, Matamata and Rotorua and involved the taking of two cars, which both ran out of petrol.

The following week, O’Rourke picked up a worker at the freezing works, who was driving them home in the stolen car. But in Newmarket they were chased by a police constable in a taxi and raced across town, speeding through traffic lights, before they quit the car in Pitt St and took off separate directions. Both were soon caught. It was O’Rourke’s efforts to sell the opium which had led to his identification and capture.

He told the police: “If I had had my way we would have burned that stuff. It’s no good anyway.”

One of the people he approached was a Chinese fruiterer and gardener in Hamilton. The police said those who rejected the opium gave them a very good description of O’Rourke.

A blood-stained shoe whose sole exactly matched a footprint on a carpet from Lee’s house was produced as evidence. The Crown said it was O’Rourke’s.

O’Rourke and Malcolm pleaded not guilty, but were convicted of the joint charge of murder and sentenced to life in jail with hard labour. Eleven jurists had added a rider seeking mercy for Malcolm. He unsuccessfully appealed on grounds that he had withdrawn from the common purpose with O’Rourke. It was also argued the judge misdirected the jury by not saying it could find him guilty of manslaughter.

Lee was cremated and his ashes were returned to China. O’Rourke died in 1978, Malcolm in 1991, both aged 63.