Walter James Bolton (13 August 1888 – 18 February 1957) was a New Zealand farmer who was found guilty of poisoning his wife.
An autopsy found traces of arsenic in her body, and a police investigation was launched.
Bolton's defence argued that Beatrice could have been poisoned accidentally, by arsenic entering the water supply.
According to a contemporary newspaper account, his execution was allegedly botched – instead of breaking his neck instantly, he was slowly strangled to death.
[2] In the parliamentary debate on the death penalty in 1961 the Bolton case was referred to (without naming him) by two Labour MPs Walter Nash and Fred Hackett as an executed murderer whose guilt was doubted by counsel, his doctor and the clergyman who officiated at the execution.