CANADA: Monoxide Mercy

For eight months in his two and a half years of life, little Victor Christopher Ramberg had screamed day & night in excruciating agony. His cancered eyes poured a million devils of pain into his small head, taking away his sight. Doctors said he could not live more than six months longer.

For eight months Victor and Dorothy Ramberg bore their child’s screams. They nursed it patiently, tenderly; but the time came when they could stand it no longer.

Together they went into Calgary from Keoma, the little Alberta town where Victor Ramberg struggled to make a living as a grain-elevator salesman. Victor Ramberg bought two lengths of hose pipe. Next day, after dissuading his wife from wanting to die with the baby, he attached the hose to the exhaust of his 1935 Hudson, put the other end in the child’s crib, started the motor.

The carbon monoxide gas brought quiet to the child. From time to time the parents went into the room to look at their son. Finally the mother took it from the crib, walked up and down a few times, hugging and kissing the child. It was dead.

Then, as Ramberg walked to the door of the room, he staggered and fell. His wife tried to drag him outside. She too dropped unconscious from the fumes. When a neighbor called later, he found Dorothy babbling crazily. Her husband was still lying on the floor.

Last week Victor Ramberg was under observation at Ponoka mental hospital and Dorothy was facing a murder charge at Calgary.