The poison and Mrs Doull

Twelve years after he died, Alexander Doull’s body was exhumed in 1964, a drastic step for anyone to take.
Suspicion had fallen on his widow - Margaret Murray Doull - after the death of her sister Janet Belle Greenhorn, believed to have been poisoned with arsenic.
Janet had been in Oakley Mental Hospital in 1964 before leaving to move in with her sister Margaret in Takanini, Auckland. Within months she was dead.
Margaret was born Margaret Murray Hutchinson on May 13, 1912 in Timaru to John Edward Hutchinson and his wife Helen. She had an older brother Ian and of course, Janet.
She married Alexander George Doull in 1935 and they quickly had four children.
It can’t have been easy for her. She was bright, ambitious and intelligent and had once considered becoming a doctor. But instead she was a clerk at the Auckland Electric Power Board while her husband ran his farm.
It was hard work and Alexander became ill and depressed, withdrawing from the world more and more. By 1951, the farm was running at a loss and it was transferred into her name. And in January 1952, Alexander died.
At the time the cause of death was given as influenza.
Margaret married again - William John Jackson - but unknown to her, he was already married and ended up being charged with bigamy then imprisoned for six months.
She took in boarders to make money for a while but when Jackson was released from prison they headed to Australia. From journals she wrote it was clear she was sleeping with multiple men.
By 1963, she was back in New Zealand (Jackson died in 1962) and took in her sister.
Janet became ill and Margaret said it was flu. Janet died on August 22, 1964, and after the police were called in, Margaret was charged with murder. Pathology tests said Janet died from repeated doses of arsenic. And Margaret was shown to have bought the poison.
It led to Alexander’s body being exhumed and Margaret being charged with his death.
She denied both but it took the jury just over an hour to find her guilty and she was imprisoned for life for murder.
Janet was cremated and her ashes scattered at Purewa Cemetery while Alexander was buried in Maunu Cemetery in Northland.
Where Margaret went after her prison sentence (or if she did) is not known. But she had already said she had a lover waiting for her.