Another in our series of new transcriptions of contemporary articles on the Leo Frank case.
Atlanta Constitution
Sunday, June 1st, 1913
Friends of Leo Frank Have Tried to Intimidate Him, Negro Sweeper Tells Detective Chief as Reason for His Transfer to the Police Station.
LANFORD RAPS SHERIFF DECLARING HE IS NOT ASSISTING THE POLICE
“He Appears to Be Placing Obstacles in Our Way,” Asserts Chief, in Speaking of Attempts to Interview the Suspected Superintendent. Mangum Denies Intimidation Attempts.
Chief of Detectives Newport Lanford is authority for the statement that James Conley, the negro floor sweeper of the National Pencil factory, who, in his latest affidavit, has admitted his complicity in the Mary Phagan murder, after the killing, but lays the crime at the door of Superintendent Leo M. Frank, was removed from Fulton county Tower to police barracks for imprisonment at his own request to put an end to the attempts of the friends of the superintendent to intimidate him.
Conley was carried to the police barracks Saturday afternoon after he had been removed from the Tower to the courthouse, where he was put through two hours of questioning by Solicitor General Hugh M. Dorsey and his counsel, Attorney W. M. Smith.
Wanted to Avoid Frank’s Friends.
Chief of Detectives Lanford declared to a Constitution reporter last night that Conley had asked him to be taken away from the Tower to escape the harassments of the visitors of Leo Frank, declaring that they stopped at his cell and tried to make him drink liquor, and had tried to intimidate him by making jeering remarks to him and implying threats. Continue Reading →