Another in our series of new transcriptions of contemporary articles on the Leo Frank case.

Atlanta Constitution
August 22nd, 1913

LAWYERS’ BATTLE WILL END TODAY AND JUDGE WILL CHARGE THE JURY

In First Speech for State on Wednesday Morning, Frank Hooper Scored General Conditions at National Pencil Factory, Terming Leo Frank, a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Explaining How Easy It Was for People Who Saw Only One Side of Him to Imagine Him a Paragon of Virtue.

REUBEN ARNOLD BRANDS JIM CONLEY MURDERER OF LITTLE PHAGAN GIRL

Attorney for Defense Dwells on Horror of Convicting Man Upon Purely Circumstantial Evidence, and Cites Many Instances Where Such Action Has Resulted in Great Injustice to the Accused. Scores Detective Department Unmercifully and Charges They Concocted Story Which Conley Told on Stand.

Unless all calculations are upset the Frank case should be ready to go to the jury tonight, provided Judge Roan does not decide to postpone his charge until Saturday morning — in which event the case will reach the Jury during the forenoon Saturday.

After that time, it is all a matter of speculation as to the time the verdict will be returned. It may be returned turned in a few moments after the jury retires; again, it may be hours or days. The general opinion is, however, that Frank will know his fate some time Saturday.

Frank Hooper Opens for State.

Thursday, saw the beginning of the big battle of the lawyers to persuade the jury, from the evidence introduced, of the guilt or innocence for the prisoner. […]

LAWYERS’ BATTLE WILL END TODAY

Frank Hooper, who has been assisting Solicitor Hugh Dorsey, opened for the state shortly after court convened at 9 o’clock. He spoke for over two hours, and in conclusion read from many authorities, law governing the application of circumstantial evidence.

Mr. Hooper’s speech was a calm, dispassionate appeal to the reason of the jury. He prefaced his remarks by stating that the state was not seeking a verdict of guilty unless the defendant was in truth guilty. The state, he said, was merely seeking to find and punish the murderer.

He touched on general conditions at the pencil factory, and said as a citizen of Atlanta he was by no means proud. He pictured the place as a moral eyesore and in passing referred to Darley and Schiff and Frank as being responsible for the existence of these conditions.

Of Frank’s character he said:

“You have heard the testimony of girls who still work there and they say it is good. You have also heard the testimony of women and girls who formerly worked there, and they say it is bad.”

He referred to Leo Frank as a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and explained how easy it was for people who saw only one side of him to imagine him a paragon of the virtues. He told of what he termed the man’s persistent pursuit of Mary Phagan. He spoke of the discharge of Gantt, the only man who knew Mary Phagan at all well, and said this was significant of the man’s designs on the girl.

Fight of Rosser and Negro.

Coming down to the negro Conley, he said it was only truth that had held him in the stand for three days against the hammering of the mighty Luther Rosser. He took up the negro’s version in detail and plausible and how it was plausible and how it was impossible for the negro to have committed the crime without Frank having known something about it. He touched on all phases of the case and in particular paid his respects to the Pinkertons and the bloody club and the pay envelope found in the factory. These, he said, were planted.

Mr. Hooper made a favorable impression on the crowd and had his facts well in hand.

Rube Arnold’s Long Speech.

Reuben Arnold began speaking at 7 minutes to 12 o’clock and spoke until 12:30 o’clock, when a recess was taken until 2 o’clock. From that time on he spoke until a quarter to 6 o’clock, or over four hours and a half in all.

His speech was one of the most wonderful efforts ever delivered in the south. Beginning in a quiet, conversational tone of voice, Mr. Arnold dwelt on the horror of convicting a man on purely circumstantial evidence. He referred to the Durant case in San Francisco, the Hampton case in England, and the Dreyfus case in France as instances where men had been done an awful injustice on circumstantial or perjured evidence.

He spoke at some length of the feeling against Frank because he is a Jew, and said that the spirit of the mob who would convict and hang him simply because he was a Jew was no worse than that of the murderer who had killed little Mary Phagan.

He ridiculed the idea of the state that Leo Frank laid a plot to get Mary Phagan to the building on Saturday and commit a crime. He said Frank had no way of knowing that Mary Phagan would not draw her pay on Friday and would be at the pencil factory on Saturday. He said the murder of Little Mary Phagan was the unreasoning crime of a negro.

He ridiculed the whole theory that the murder was committed on the second floor, and advanced the idea that Conley had killed the child on the first floor and thrown her body down the elevator shaft.

He scored the detective department unmercifully and charged they had concocted the story for Conley to tell. They would have fixed the crime on Newt Lee If the negro had been of the pliant kind who could have been used.

He described the finding of the bloody shirt at Lee’s house as a “plant.”

Solicitor Dorsey was criticized for having joined in with the detectives in the hunt for the murderer. He had been over zealous, he said, and could not view the case dispassionately.

He poked all manner of fun at Conley’s statement, and declared the idea of Frank taking an ignorant negro into his confidence was preposterous. The negro was simply Iying to save his neck, he said. Toward the conclusion of his speech he introduced a chart giving the time of Frank’s movements on the day of the murder. He concluded by saying the case was made up of two P’s—perjury and prejudice.

The courtroom was crowded from 9 o’clock until adjournment hour. Many ladles — friends of Mrs. Frank — were in the audience.

Luther Rosser will begin speaking at 9 o’clock this morning. Hugh Dorsey will conclude for the state at the afternoon session.

* * *

Atlanta Constitution, August 22nd 1913, “Frank Case May Go to Jury Late This Afternoon,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)

Another in our series of new transcriptions of contemporary articles on the Leo Frank case.

Atlanta Constitution
August 22nd, 1913

“Your honor, and gentlemen of the jury.” spoke Mr. Hooper, the first of the attorneys to address the court, “the object of this trial, as well as all other trials, is the ascertainment of truth and the attainments of justice. In the beginning, I want to have It understood that we are not seeking a verdict of guilty against the defendant unless he is guilty.”

“The burden of guilt is upon our shoulders—we confront the undertaking of putting It upon his. We recognize that it must be done beyond a reasonable doubt, and that it must be purely by the evidence which we produced before you.”

“We have cheerfully assumed this burden. We have cheerfully undertaken this task, but, there is not a single man on the prosecution who would harm a hair of the defendant’s head wrongfully. We want him given the same measure of justice that should be meted to all classes of defendants. He is entitled, though, to the same degree of law as any other prisoner.”

“But, he is not entitled to any more because of his wealth or social position. The arm of the law is strong enough to reach to the highest pinnacle of position and drag down the guilty, and strong enough to probe into the gutter and drag up the lowest.”

The Jury’s Responsibility.

“There is not a case in the history of Georgia that has been as long and as important as this. With this importance, there arises a great degree of responsibility that rests upon your shoulders. I call your attention to the facts of law as they will be given you in the charge—your only instructions, the orders by which you will be guided in the end.”

“There is one thing I want to say, and that is this: This man should not be convicted purely because the law is seeking a victim. The law doesn’t demand it. It demands only that you seek the truth, the absolute truth, the showing of which is required by us, the prosecution.”

“We are not lacking for blood indiscriminately. We are only seeking the slayer of Mary Phagan, and in seeking him, I try as much as possible to feel as though I were one of you twelve.”

“Now, let’s see what was the situation on April 26 1913 in the pencil factory. This factory was being run by Sigmund Montag as its boss, Frank as its superintendent, assisted by the handsome Mr. Darley and the able Mr. Schiff.

Condemn Factory Conditions.

“As a citizen of Atlanta, I am not proud of conditions that existed in that factory! What was its moral atmosphere? The character of it appeals wonderfully to us as we seek truth.”

“The defense has produced numbers of girl workers who told us of his character. They say it is good. That is only negative because he has never harmed them. They do not know him. But, while we are considering their stories, there are the stories of others—girls who left his factory because of his character and his conduct toward them.”

“They say his character is bad. You have from the two your choice of either. Those who still are  there—those who have never been harmed—and those who have left because of him and his character.”  

“The law is a peculiar thing. We named over our plans with the first witnesses put on the stand. We showed at first just exactly what we had in view, exposed our hand, so to speak, and even went so far as to put the stories before you in so far as they were allowed to be told. They could have gone into detail were we permitted to have allowed them. They could have told of incidents that would have been convincing.”

Arnold’s Objection Overruled.

Here Attorney Arnold interrupted the speech, objecting on grounds that Mr. Hooper’s argument was improper. He was overruled, however.”

“So, gentlemen,” continued the speaker, we have adopted the only legal manner in which such evidence can be sifted. It’s on this principle”:

“If fifty men were asked of the character of a certain place or man, and twenty-five or more say it is good, while as few as ten say it’s bad, what Is the character of this place or person, considering, of course, that all have an equal opportunity to observe?”

“Would you say it was good? This question of character was one, into which we were not permitted to go. But the defense, on the other hand, were allowed to let down the bars and walk in.”

“That pencil factory was a great place for a man without a conscience. It was a great piece for Frank, his handsome assistant,” Mr. Darley, and the able Mr. Schiff. We find that Frank had coupled himself up for nightly meeting with Dalton, who now has, it seems, turned respectable. My friends, no doubt, will argue that it was strange a man of such business and social position should consort with such a character. It will be a good argument, likely, but probe a little deeper and see if Dalton was not the kind of man required by a dual personality such as possessed by Frank?”

Dual Personalities.

“We all have dual personalities. There is not a man so good without evil, and no man so bad without good. But when the evil is predominant, the man is bad. Vice versa with the good. A man may mingle with his varnished class by day, but when the shades of night are falling and the evil dominate, he doesn’t go and get good men who can tell of his good character. He goes for his Dalton. We all are Dr. Jekylls and Mr. Hydes. There are two sides to each of us.”

“Dalton seems to have overcome this evil. He is apparently making good, as many substantial folks have told us on the witness stand. You can’t blame Dalton so much.”

“This factory was under the control of this man Frank. It is a house of bad reputation. You find other acts of this sort committed therein. It is unsavory. Frank is its head. He contends he did not know Mary Phagan. Why, every day as he walked through the floor on which his office was situated, he passed by her at her machine. You find, gentlemen, that, he often stopped at her place of duty to show her this or to show her this or to show her that, to help her in her work, Not only that, but he followed her out of her beaten path — following like some wild animal, telling her of his superiority, coaxing, persuading, all the while she strove to return to her work at her machine.”

When Gantt Entered Case.

“You will notice on this diagram that every time Frank crossed the floor he passed this beautiful girl, looking upon her with the eye of lust. They find other acts; first indication of his attitude toward his victim, is in the tall, good-natured Jim Gantt, friend of Mary Phagan. Frank asks Gantt: ‘You’re pretty thick with Mary, aren’t you?’”

“It shows that he knew her and that he had his eye on her”

“What next?”

“He wants to get rid of Gantt. How does he go about it? You have seen that previously he was bragging on Gantt, on Gantt’s ability as a workman. But, just as soon as his eye is set upon the pretty little friend of Gantt, he sets plans to get rid of him.”

“And, it comes up about a dollar.”

“He says it was something about money, hoping to lead you, gentlemen, to believe that Gantt was a thief. He would not let Gantt go into the building because he was a ‘thief’.”

“Didn’t he know that this long-legged mountaineer was coming back at him? Sure, he knew it. And, they parted company at once. Gantt was fired.”

“What was he accomplishing by this?”

“He was getting rid of the only man on either floor—in the whole factory—who knew Mary Phagan, and who would raise a hand to protect her.”

Starts Laying His Plans.

“Then, he sets about laying plans. And those plans!”

“You will notice that the defense has pitched its every effort entirely on Jim Conley. I don’t blame them. He was like Stone Mountain is to some highways in its vicinity. They couldn’t get by him. We could have left him out and have had an excellent chain of circumstantial evidence. Without Jim, though, the defense couldn’t move —they couldn’t budge.”              

“You have sat and seen the biggest legal battle ever fought in a court-house between skillful intellect and a witness negro. You have seen brainy eloquence pitted against the slow, incomprehensible dialect of a negro. You have seen a trained and speedy mind battling with blunt ignorance. And, what was the result?”

“At the end of three and a half days it came. That negro was asked questions about everything Rosser could conceive. His answers were hurried from the stenographer’s notes and transcribed on typewriter. Then, they were hurled back into Conley’s face. But, it was like water poured onto a mill wheel. They, received the same answers, the same story.”

Negro’s Story Unbroken.

“It was because, gentlemen, the negro was telling the truth. Truth is stronger than all the brains and ingenuity that can be collected in this whole town—this state, the world. How they did hate to give up the fight. They lost, and with the loss went the loss of their theory in whole.”

“When all was through, they were forced to sit and leave Jim’s truth unscathed. How unfortunate! All they could say was that Jim Conley had been a big liar. That is true. In his first two stories, he lied. But, if I had any comment on Jim Conley, it would be that if they had bored me as they bored him at police headquarters, they could have muddled me even more.”

“Suppose Frank’s conduct in this case is shown as it has been. He is a smart man. There is no disputing that fact. He needn’t have told you all the details on the stand of the amount of work he did that day. You can tell that he is smart, clever, and ingenious.”

“Now, Jim, he comes back that Saturday morning by order of the brilliant Frank, his boss. There’s no denial of this so far. Other people tell you they have seen women enter the factory with men at suspicious hours. Jim tells you of watching for these folks. And there is this to reckon with:

“Providence has a way of revealing the truth at the final minute. At the eleventh hour we found two men yesterday who had been to the pencil factory at the noon that Mary Phagan was murdered. They saw Jim Conley just as he tells you, sitting on the first floor, near the door where he watched for Frank.”

“Mrs. White saw him, although she doesn’t identify him perfectly. One thing true, she saw a negro in the position Jim tells us he was in.”

“Now, for what purpose was he there?”

“Waiting to do the same thing he had done before—to watch for his boss. They say he was drunk. Very well. But, did you notice how clearly he recited incidents and told the names of people he saw at the times they claim he was so drunk?“

The Time of the Tragedy.

“We are brought up to the time of the tragedy. Jim Is still there. Everybody has gone, leaving him and Frank in the building. Frank knew that Mary Phagan was coming that day, and he knew the hour. On the previous afternoon little Helen Ferguson, Mary’s chum, had called for Mary’s pay, and Frank had told her that Mary would come and gel her own pay, breaking a rule of the plant in doing so.”

“He arranges with Jim to hang around and make himself convenient. Jim takes his accustomed seat in the hallway. Parties come and go. Jim observes all that happens, he says nothing, Finally Mary Phagan arrives, beautiful, innocent, coming in her blue frock and new hat and a ribbon around her hair.”

“Without any thought of evil or foreboding of tragedy, she tripped into the building and up the stairs, going for $1.20. No explanation can come from Mary Phagan. The dead have no stories to tell. She went in a little after 12. She found Frank. He tells us that much from his own lips. He was there from 12 to 1. It’s his own statement. What a statement!”

“There was Mary Phagan. Then, there was another little girl, Monteen Stover. He never knew Monteen was there, and he said he stayed in his office from 12 until after 1—never left. Monteen waited around for five minutes. Then she left.”

“The result?”

“There comes for the first time from the lips of Leo Frank, the defendant, the admission that he might have gone to some other part of the building during this time—he didn’t remember clearly.”

The Pursuing Footsteps.

“Jim Conley, sitting faithfully downstairs, heard footsteps going toward the metal room. Then there came the sound of other footsteps, footsteps that pursued. There was no return of the first footsteps, and the footsteps that pursued tiptoed back from the metal room.”

“Then Leo stamped the office floor.”

“I will be fair with Frank. When he followed the child back into the metal room, he didn’t know that it would necessitate force to accomplish his purpose. I don’t believe he originally had murder in his heart.”

“There was a scream. Jim Conley heard it. Just for the sake of knowing how harrowing it was, I wish you jurymen could hear a similar scream. It was poorly described by the negro. He said it sounded as if a laugh was broken off into a shriek. He heard it break through the stillness of the hushed building. It was uncanny, but he sat faithfully on. He was under orders.”

“He was to come on signal. That scream was no signal. Later, Frank would stamp on the office floor.”

“This negro tells you that the white man killed the little girl. But, no! Frank was in his office, busy with his wonderful financial sheet. I will show you how he could have sat at his desk and heard this negro attacking the little child who had come to draw her pay.”

Turns to Diagram.

The speaker turned to the diagram, showing the jury the nearness of the metal room to Frank’s office, explaining his theory that nothing could have happened on the floor without being heard or seen by Frank.

“Mr. Frank, I will give you the benefit of all you deserve. When all is summed up, you were sitting only a few feet from the spot where a murder was committed, and you never raised a finger.”

“Let me show you something else. When this thing was over, there were two men and a woman upstairs who had to get out the building before the body was moved. It would be dangerous to leave it lying back in the metal room, staring hideously from unseeing eyes.”

“Frank went upstairs and told the trio up there that if they were going. It was time for them to leave, as we was going to lock up the factory. He was in a hurry and told them so. Mrs. Arthur White, perceiving his hurry, hastened downstairs. When she reached his office, Frank, the man-in-a-hurry, was in his shirt sleeves, writing at his desk.”

“Frank went upstairs and told the trio who were up there that it was time for them to leave, as he was going to lock up the factory. He was in a hurry and told them so. Mrs. Arthur White, seeing that he was in a hurry, hurried downstairs. When she reached the office, Frank, the man who was in a hurry, was in his shirt sleeves, writing at his desk.

“Why Should I Hang.“

“‘Why should I hang?’ What does that show? In the first place, his appreciation of a little girl of 14 years old. Did it hurt him to knot the rope of cord around her neck? Did it hurt him as he drew it tighter and tighter around the tender throat until the dim spark of life was choked extinct?”

“To the contrary. It only excited him enough to ask himself the question:”

“‘Why should I hang?’”

“There come times when we all speak out our true thoughts and sentiment. That was such a time.”

“Now, which Is the more probable—that Jim heard this expression, or that he imagined the story?”

“Did Jim know Frank had relatives In Brooklyn?”

“Did Jim know there was such a thing as Brooklyn?”

“Did he know they were rich?”

“And Jim says, with the typical soul of Africa:”

“‘What’s going to become of me?’”

“Frank says ‘I’ll take care of you, for I’ll write my mother a letter, so that she can help you.’ He asks Jim if he can write, and Jim tells him a little bit. He wasn’t on his guard. He should have detected Frank’s purpose. Frank was smart. Jim was built, Frank dictated. Jim wrote.”

“Now, gentlemen, I suppose most of you are southern men, men who know the characteristics of the negro. Will you please tell me what idea this negro would have had to write these notes accusing a negro, and, just the same as saying, this was done by a negro who is a fool and who cannot write? It was foolish enough for the mighty brain of Leo Frank to put the notes beside the body.”

When Frank Lost His Head.

“The truth of the business is that this looks like the only time the brainy Frank ever lost his head.”

“Then, next comes the money. Frank pulls out his roll of bills and says ‘Jim, here’s that $200.’ Jim is so overwhelmed that he doesn’t notice the amount but puts the roll in his pocket. Frank reflects. He need not waste the $200. Jim is as deep in the mire as he is In the mud. He recovers the money.”

“’Let’s see, Jim, if everything comes out all right; I’ll return this money.”

“He tells Jim that Jim has the goods to deliver. The body must be disposed of. That will be left to him. He depends on Jim’s lust for the $200 to bring him back to the factory to burn the corpse of little Mary, the victim!”

“Nobody else was expected by him that afternoon but Jim Conley and Newt Lee.”

Came Back To Burn Body.

“It makes no difference to me about how long it took Frank to go to lunch, the minute he put in here and the minute he put in there, about which there has been such a squabble in the evidence. That is aside from the point. The fact remains that at or about 3 o’clock he came back to the pencil factory to await the arrival of Jim Conley to burn that body!”

“He was expecting Jim Conley, and he also knew that Newt Lee was coming. Aye, there was the rub! He expected them both, and it depended upon which one arrived first as to how things would go. If Jim got there first and disposed of that body, all right; but suppose Newt Lee got there first!”

“Then was the defendant in the position of Napoleon at the battle of Waterloo, – when he wondered which army would arrive first, and knew that upon this question depended victory or defeat. The wrong army arrived, and Napoleon went down!”

“Newt Lee arrived at the pencil factory that afternoon, but where was Jim Conley? Yes, that’s what the defendant ‘asked himself, ‘Where Is Jim Conley?’”

“Jim Conley was getting that much needed sleep after the exciting events he had gone through with. That’s where Jim Conley was.“

“Then was the defendant lost.”

Newt Lee Sent Away.

“He sent Newt Lee away, with the last hope that Jim might yet turn up and burn the body as had been agreed upon. ‘Go out and have a good time, Newt,’ that’s what the defendant told good old honest Newt Lee.”

“He said, ‘it is not Newt Lee I want, it is Jim Conley. Go away, Newt, and stay until 6 o’clock. Give me two hours more.’”

“Two hours passed and Jim Conley did not show up. He was taking that much needed nap. Newt came back, and the game was up.”

“He talked to Newt Lee about the night’s work and started home.”

Why Did Frank Flinch?

“Now, gentlemen of the jury, I want to call your attention to a very peculiar thing.”

“As the defendant passed out of the factory door he met James Gantt, old long-legged Gantt, who was looking for his shoes.”

“Witnesses testified that the defendant jumped back startled. Why? Think, why?”

“He wasn’t afraid of James Gantt, Gantt wouldn’t hurt a flea. That wasn’t the reason.” 

“He knew that Gantt knew Mary Phagan and had lived close to the family, and Frank thought that Gantt was looking for little Mary, who was missing from home and should have been back long ago. That’s why he Jumped back when he saw Gantt.”

“He had called Gantt down about ‘setting up’ to Mary, and had fired him over an argument about who was going to pay a dollar or so. He didn’t think that Gantt stole that paltry dollar.”

“He expected him to ask where Mary Phagan was. That, gentlemen of the jury, is why he jumped back when he saw Gantt.”

“But Gantt spoke to the defendant. He Just said. ‘Howdy, Mr. Frank.’ The defendant felt relieved then.”

“Gantt told him that he had left a pair of shoes in the factory and wanted to get them. But it won’t do to let him go in that building now, thought the defendant. Suppose he should find out? He mustn’t go in there. So the defendant said that he thought he had seen a nigger sweeping Gantt’s shoes out of the building.”

“Then Gantt said he had two pairs of shoes in there and that maybe the other pair wasn’t swept out.”

“This was the Iast hope. What could he say to that? He had said that he saw the nigger sweeping out only one pair. In a few days this murder must be put anyway. To keep Gantt out would arouse his suspicions. He would have to let him in this time.”

“And this is what went on in the defendant’s mind: ‘I’ll let him in, but I’ll guard him like a thief.’ And he said, ‘Newt, go with him.’

“Strange to say, Gantt found both pairs of shoes, just where he said he had left them.”

“Gentlemen, does that look like the defendant had seen a nigger sweeping them out? Does that look like the truth?”

Called Up Factory.

“After he had let James Milton Gantt in the factory, what did he do?”

“He called up the factory by phone, a thing that he never had done before. Why? Why did he do that thing? Gantt! Gantt! Gantt! That’s why!”

“He wanted to know if Gantt had gone and whether he was any the wiser. He couldn’t rest until he knew this. This Banquo’s ghost of James Gantt was haunting him.”

“But when he knew that Gantt was safely gone and everything was all right, he was in a fine humor then. He could laugh and talk. He could sit down in the house with his wife and read baseball in the newspaper. He could laugh and try playfully to break up a card game. He felt fine and relieved. As glad and free as a school boy!

“Old long-legged Gantt was gone, and everything was gone, and everything was all right!

“Now, about Newt Lee. I don’t want to thresh out all the details in this respect. You remember the evidence about honest old Newt Lee’s finding the body. That’s all we need to know about him. No suspicion attaches to Newt.”

“He notified the police, and tried to notify Frank. The police came and took the body of little Mary Phagan to the undertakers.”

Frank’s Nervousness.

“The police called up Frank then and told him they wanted him. Detective Starnes got mixed up when he told about this on the stand, but he never forgot that when he called Frank up Frank did not ask him what the trouble was. He didn’t ask him whether anybody had been killed at the factory. He didn’t ask them if everything at the factory was all right.”

“They took Frank to the undertakers.”

“He was nervous then. But have you seen a quiver of a muscle since he has been these weeks in the courtroom? He is facing the fight now, and his nerves are set. But that morning he was as nervous as a cat.”

“He said,” continued Hooper, “‘I think it’s a girl I paid off yesterday. I’ll have to look at my books and see.’

“That’s what he said about the body of the girl he saw every day and talked to. He offered no consolation, or anything. He got away from there.”

“Another thing, when they carried him to the basement and brought him back upstairs, what was going on in his mind then? He thought he must look at that time slip. So he got the key and unlocked the clock and took out the slip. He examined it while others were looking over his shoulders and said it was correctly punched, that it was all right, and others agreed to it.”

“Here’s the slip.”

Hooper exhibited to the jury the slip.

“He said, ‘That’s all right. That clears you, Newt.’”

Throws Suspicion on Newt.

“What next occurred to him? He saw he was getting into a fix, and he had better take a shot at Newt Lee. What happens? Another slip turns up. He says he was mistaken at first. There were lapses in the punches on the slip, showing time enough unaccounted for to allow Newt to go home.”

“John Black caught what was up.”

“He goes to Newt Lee’s home. He unlocks the door with his keys and looks in the house and on the trash pile, and in the bottom of the barrel, with a lot of things piled on top of it, he found a bloody shirt! How did it get there? Newt Lee accounts for his time Sunday. No suspicion attaches to Newt Lee. He is a free man. How did that bloody shirt get there?”

“It had to be planted. Gentlemen, it was planted!“

“Here are the two propositions, gentlemen. If Newt Lee was to be made the Goat, suspicion had to be directed to him. Somebody had to plant that suspicion.”

Peculiar Things About Shirt.

“There are some peculiar things about that shirt, gentlemen.”  

“It is a hand-made shirt.”

“Newt Lee said it it is a home-made shirt, it’s mine; if it’s a store-bought shirt, it’s not mine.”

“Lo, and behold, it’s a home-made shirt!”

“But what do we­­ find? That shirt is bloodied partly on the inside and partly on the outside, and the blood did not entirely soak through either way. How could this happen? It could happen but one way—it was crumpled up and wiped in blood!”

“Moreover, this was & freshly laundered shirt. The button holes had never even been opened to receive the buttons. There was absolutely no odor about the shirt as would be about a shirt that had been worn.”

“He would sacrifice Newt Lee that he might live!”

“The Bible says, “What man give for his life?”

“He was willing to: give the life of Newt Lee that his own life might be spared. He was willing to give the life of James Gantt that he might live. Was not Gantt arrested a few days after?”

“But not once at that time did he think of giving the life of Jim Conley! But somebody found Jim Conley washing a shirt to go to the trial and there was where Jim got into trouble.”  

Turns Upon Jim Conley.

“But Frank didn’t try to fix it on Jim then. He waited until Newt had failed, and all else had failed, except the suspicion which rested upon himself. Then he turned on Jim Conley.

“I call your attention, gentlemen of the jury, to another peculiar thing.”

“Weeks after the murder and after the factory had been searched, a big bloody stick was found by shrewd Pinkerton detectives, who can find anything—even an elephant if it gets in the way. They also found a piece of envelope. But, fortunately, they showed this to Mr. Coleman, who said that Mary had received but $1.20 and that the figure ‘5’ on the envelope had no business there. And so, it was rubbed out. Besides the shirt, then, we find the club and the pay envelope.”

“Another very peculiar thing is about this man named Mincey.”

“Conley was asked, ‘Didn’t you confess to Mincey that you were the man that killed the girl?” “Conley said, ‘No.'”

“That question was asked, gentlemen, as a foundation upon which to introduce Mincey.”

“Where is Mincey?”

“He Is the man who could clear it and so, besides the shirt. He is the man around whom it appeared that the whale fight would center. If he could convince you that Jim Conley confessed the murder to him that would let Leo Frank out!”

“Yet where is Mincey”

“Gentlemen, this has been a long testimony which you have had to sit through, and I do not wish to take up any more of your time than necessary.”

Placard Brought Into Court.

The jury retired from the room for a few minutes, and a large placard, about the size of an ordinary sign, was brought into the room by the defense, upon which were bulletinized the main points of the testimony.

When the jury came back, Hooper read to them the law upon the relevancy of character evidence and that defining reasonable doubt.

Hooper explained to the jury that the only belief required that they would have upon the street, at their places of business or in their homes, and that on this belief they were to act. “Simply use your common sense in the jury box,” said he. “I thank you”

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Atlanta Constitution, August 22nd 1913, “In Dramatic Phrases Hooper Outlines Events Leading Up to and Following Death of Girl,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)

Atlanta Constitution
August 21st, 1913

The opening argument in the Frank trial will be made at 9 o’clock this morning by Attorney Frank B. Hooper, associate counsel for the defense.

Two hours probably will be occupied by each man in the closing arguments. Judge Roan, in a short talk to the attorneys for each side, cautioned them against long argument, and insisted that each man dwell only on the facts of the case and the evidence.

No time limit was set, although the prediction is widespread that no more than two hours will be occupied by each man.

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Frank A. Hooper’s Closing Arguments: https://leofrank.info/trial-and-evidence/prosecution/mr-hooper/

Audiobook of Hooper’s Closing Arguments: https://leofrank.info/new-audio-book-the-american-mercury-on-leo-frank-hoopers-closing-arguments/

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Atlanta Constitution, August 21st 1913, “Frank Hooper Opens Argument in Leo Frank Case This Morning,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)

Another in our series of new transcriptions of contemporary articles on the Leo Frank case.

Atlanta Constitution
August 10^th, 1913

ROSSER CALLS HIM BEAU BRUMMEL OF BAR

By Britt Craig.

He has a kind and genial face that makes you feel he is the friend of everybody in the world, but in the midst of a big trial he might be compared with a Gatling gun, except for the fact that there doubtless are witnesses who would prefer facing the Gatling.

There is a liberal sprinkling of gray in his hair, and Luther Rosser has often truthfully, although sarcastically, referred to him as the Beau Brummel of the bar.

You would never suspect that he was a lawyer. Your first impression would be that he was an author, an actor or lecturer.

That he would work as untiringly and persistently to hang a man as Culumbus worked to find America, would never enter your mind, and you would dispute the word of your most verarious friend on the subject.

Dorsey Secures Hooper.

When Solicitor Hugh Dorsey faced the task of prosecuting Leo M. Frank he set about to find a colleague worthy of the undertaking. He selected Frank Hooper, a well-known corporation attorney.

The Atlanta public, which, as a rule, keeps in touch with only the spectacular cases, wondering at the choice, inquired who is Hooper?

The solicitor stood sponsor for his man, and consulted the parents of Mary Phagan on his choice. Mr. and Mrs. Coleman put the brand of approval upon him the moment they saw him, and Frank Hooper was entered as associate counsel.

The public speculated considerably, as the public is prone to do, and waited eagerly for a display of the talents of this colleague. A portion of the public—that portion which knows what to do in such cases—looked up “Men of Mark in Georgia,” and finding much space devoted to the name of Hooper, concluded that Dorsey had chosen logically.

Audiences Watch Hooper.

Then came the trial. A man of small stature, no larger than the solicitor himself, sat with Mr. Dorsey and conferred with him as only an associate would be privileged to do. The audience whispered that this must be Hooper.

“Well, he looks all right, has a clever face, and that smile just won’t come off.”

The first impression, therefore, was satisfactory, and the curious public began to take even a greater interest in this Hooper than it had before.

His fame spread fully as quickly. His speeches were incisive and clear-pointed. There was something irresistible about his arguments, and he seemed to know a wonderful lot about laws.

A Barricade of Law Books.

Several days ago, when the argument was in progress over the attempt by the defense to expunge certain parts of Jim Conley’s testimony, Frank Hooper came into the courtroom with an armful of thick books. Two deputies followed him, carrying proportionate loads.

When all others had finished voicing their respective protests, he arose from behind his barricade of legal volumes and said to the court in that polite, deliberate manner that wins the witness’ heart on cross examination before Hooper applies the vitriol.

Reads Law Instead.

“Your honor has requested that we not occupy much time in talking over this matter. I do not suppose he meant anything about reading law on the subject. If the court will be patient, I will cite numerous and varied instances of court history on which the state’s argument is based.”

He read law from one authority, and said that if the court doubted that particular expert, he would read it from another. He read old law and new, and when he had finished the audience had obtained a full education on that one point.

When he had finished he closed his remarks with only a sentence or two.

“Now, that’s the law. It’s as plain as the nose on your honor’s face. That’s one thing beyond dispute—the law.”
He resumed his seat, and a second later Judge Roan leaned over his bench and said:

“I overrule the objection of the defense.”

There was an applause that received a severe rebuke from the judge. It was improper, but that applause put an everlasting brand of approval upon the team of Dorsey and Hooper.

Hooper Toys With Witness.

And Friday, when the pattern maker who had built the pencil factory model that was submitted for the defense, was turned over to Hooper for cross examination, Hooper began toying with him, politely, mildly.

The pattern maker, who, as shown by his model, is undisputedly a mechanical genius, answered this question and that with ease, and then he became confused. When Hooper had applied the balm of kindness, he now began smearing salt and ginger. The witness admitted numerous discrepancies and Hooper, who seemed to be as thoroughly acquainted with the pencil factory premises as the man who built it, carried his point completely.

First, he had become established from a point of personal appearance, which, if it was overlooked in the first paragraphs, is as much like a statesman as an actor, author or lecturer. Then, as a student of law, a speech-maker, a debator, and now the audience dared to applaud in a courtroom as praise of his cross-fire ability.

Thus came Frank Hooper from what might be called the obscurity of corporation counsel into the glaring, dazzling limelight of associate prosecuting attorney in a state’s biggest murder trial.

In south Georgia, where big murder cases are frequent, no trial was completed without the presence of Frank Hooper. Seventeen of his forty-six years were spent in the role of prosecuting attorney. His home, for the greater part of this time, was in Americus, where he solicitor general of the southwestern circuit from 1896 to 1907.

Won Many Big Trials.

His laurels were won in many big trials, and one of them was the famous Childers case. There were others too numerous to mention. Read “Men of Mark in Georgia” if you haven’t already learned enough for your satisfaction. He was born on the banks of the Coosa, up near Rome. At his father’s death during his early boyhood he was adopted by Judge John T. Clark, of Cuthbert, in which city he spent many years.

There probably has never been a justice in Georgia more noted than Judge Clark, a man loved and honored by an entire southland. Young Frank, at the judge’s persuasion, decided upon a career in law. He went to Mercer, graduating in 1885. He’s been a lawyer since.

A. B. Caldwell, in “Men of Mark,” pays Hooper a flowery and fitting tribute on pages 123, 124 and 125. He is called Frank Arthur, and that explains the A in his name.

“Frank Arthur Hooper, now of Atlanta, but prior to 1909, for twenty years a practicing lawyer in Americus, comes of the best stock in Georgia. He was born in Floyd county, a son of B. F. and Christine T. (Fort) Hooper.

Prominent in Carolina.

“The Hooper family was very prominent in North Carolina, as shown by the colonial and state records, and one of the three signers of the Declaration of Independence. On the paternal side of his family the name is very ancient. The Hoopers, according to genealogists, took the names from a professional who put hoops on a barrel.

“Mr. Hooper’s mother was descended from that Arthur Fort so prominent during the revolutionary period, and who served in two constitutional conventions at that time. Frank A. Hooper was educated in the Southwest Georgia Agricultural college and in Mercer. He graduated from the latter with the degrees of bachelor of arts and master of arts.

“Outside of his studies, he is a reading man, partial to works of history and standard authors of fiction. He is an active member of the Ponce de Leon Baptist church, is past grand chancellor for the Georgia Knights of Pythias, is affiliated with the various Masonic bodies, is a member of the Phi Delta Theta college fraternity and a member of the University club.

“On January 18, 1888, he was married to Miss Lena Callaway. They have four children, Laurie Clark, Mary Callaway, Christina Fort and Frank Arthur, Jr.”

In conclusion, Author Caldwell writes:

“Mr. Hooper is a ardent democrat.”

Plenty More of Praise.

There is plenty more of it in Caldwell’s tribute to the man who is now assisting in the fight to convict Leo Frank. There is a lot more praise and plenty more facts of varied achievements.

He is general counsel for the Empire Life Insurance company as well as other corporations. The criminal field he had abandoned until the Frank trial came about. The old call of the courtroom battle ground, the spirit of the fight, beckoned and he answers.

But, even with all this knowledge, there is still more to be learned of Frank Arthur Hooper. It will come with the progress of the trial, for, in its present and future stages, the prosecution is on its mettle. It is keyed to a highest pitch, combating every move of the brilliant defense, fighting for this and fighting for that—battling every inch of the ground.

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Atlanta Constitution, August 10th 1913, “Frank A. Hooper is Proving Big Aid to Solicitor Dorsey,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)

Another in our series of new transcriptions of contemporary articles on the Leo Frank case.

Atlanta Journal
August 5^th, 1913

“They Haven’t Shaken Him a Particle,” Says Dorsey—“He Has Told About 240 Lies Already,” Declares Attorney Reuben Arnold

Both the state’s attorneys and the counsel for Leo M. Frank Tuesday at noon expressed satisfaction with the progress of the cross-examination of James Conley, the negro sweeper. The negro had been on the stand then for more than nine hours, during eight hours of which he had undergone a strenuous grilling at the hands of Attorney L. Z. Rosser.

“They have not shaken him a particle,” declared Solicitor Dorsey, “and that isn’t all. I don’t believe they will be able to do so.” Attorney Frank A. Hooper, who is assisting Mr. Dorsey in the prosecution of Frank said: “Mr. Rosser will go ahead and wear himself out, and Attorney Arnold will hurl questions at Conley until he, too, grows weary, and when it is all over the negro will still be there ready for more.”

Mr. Rosser was confident that he had made great headway in discredited Conley’s testimony. He smilingly commented upon how he had tangled up the negro when he got him away from his recited story, but said that when Conley got back into his well-drilled tale he ran along like a piece of well-oiled machinery. “I’ve caught him in a mass of lies,” asserted Mr. Rosser.

“Conley has lied both specifically and generally,” declared Reuben Arnold. “He has lied about material things and he has lied about immaterial things. He has told about 340 lies since he has been under cross-examination. I kept tab on him until he had told over 300 lies, and then they came so fast I couldn’t keep up with him.”

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Atlanta Journal, August 5th 1913, “Lawyers on Both Sides Satisfied With Conley,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)

Another in our series of new transcriptions of contemporary articles on the Leo Frank case.

Atlanta Georgian
August 1^st, 1913

Up Against a Hard Proposition Youthful Solicitor Is Fighting Valiantly to Win Case.

By L. F. WOODRUFF.

Georgia’s law’s most supreme penalty faces Leo Frank.

A reputation that they can not be beaten must be sustained by Luther Rosser and Reuben Arnold.

Atlanta’s detective department’s future is swaying on the issue of the Frank trial.

But there is a man with probably as much at stake as any of the hundreds who crowd Judge Roan’s courtroom, with the exception of Frank, and he is accepting the ordeal, though he realizes it, as calmly as a person who has nothing more serious to decide than whether he will order his steak rare or well done at breakfast time.

Hugh Dorsey is hereby introduced. He is known pretty well in Atlanta without introduction but as chairmen on political meetings insists on telling the audience that the President of the United States is about to speak or that the Secretary of State is endeavoring to earn an additional amount to his yearly $12,000. Mr. Dorsey can be placed before the public without fear of violating precedent.

Consider Hugh Dorsey.

Consider Dorsey’s job. His position as public prosecutor places on him the duty of sending someone to the gallows, and this time it is Leo M. Frank, against whom he must direct his efforts.

The proposition of convicting a man is as common in the life of a Solicitor as paying his car fare home. But here’s a different proposition. Dorsey is confronted with the task of getting a conviction over the efforts of Luther Rosser and Reuben Arnold to obtain an acquittal.

And anyone who knows Atlanta, who knows Fulton County, who knows Rosser, who knows Arnold, realizes that this is a task from which Hercules might sidestep, a labor that is more tremendous than the building of the Panama Canal or the successful storming of the fortress of Gibraltar.

And still Dorsey has gone into the fight unafraid; not only that, he is aggressive.

Atlanta’s record for big crime trials has not been altogether healthy in the past twelve months. In that time Dorsey has prosecuted Mrs. Daisy Grace on a charge of attempting to slay her husband. Atlanta was intensely interested in this issue. Mrs. Grace was acquitted. Dorsey lost.

He prosecuted Callie Scott Applebaum on a charge of ending the life of her husband. Again the public was deeply interested. Again Dorsey lost.

And then came the Phagan killing.

Atlanta, Georgia and the South demanded that her slayer be brought before the bar of justice and be given law’s severest penalty.

Frank was fixed upon by the police as the man.

The grand jury indicted him, and Dorsey staked his all on his conviction.

Luther Rosser had been retained by Frank’s chief counsel.

Dorsey smiled.

Again there was a flash. Reuben Arnold had been added to the list of legal array to clear the name of the superintendent of the National Pencil Factory of the charge that the had taken the life of a little girl.

Reputation is a big thing. No prize fighter faces a champion without doubts as to his ability to cope with him. The greatest financial genius probably trembled in his boots when he first met the foremost captain of industry. A violin virtuosos bows before Kubelik. There is no pianist who would approach Paderewski without a sensation of awe.

And here in Atlanta, Arnold and Rosser are champions. They are Kubeliks, they are Paderewskis.

Hugh Dorsey hasn’t quailed.

Throughout the trial he has been desperately earnest. He realizes the work that is before him. If he has any enemies, they will admit that he has handled his case well.

The Solicitor General is a great deal younger than his opponents. His hair is tinged with gray, and there will probably be more of those strands there before he is through with his clashes with the dynamic Rosser and the erudite Arnold.

He is taking the case with intense seriousness. So far, Rosser’s efforts to rattle him by calling him “Huge,” “my young friend,” “son” and “bud” have been unavailing.

The practical collapse of his detective testimony was enough to stun any man, but Dorsey stuck it out gamely. There is plenty of fight still in his eyes. It will be there if the case goes against him.

His appearance would indicate that he is holding something back, something with which he expects to surprise his eminent opponents.

Then, There is Hooper.

There is one thing that spectator knows is ebing [sic] held back. He is a quiet little man, with a scholarly face, a man who has already won the spurs in Georgia politics, but how has not figured extensively in the bigger criminal cases tried before Atlanta courts.

The man is Frank Hooper. He has been on his feet but once. He made an impression then. And when the case comes to its crucial stages, it will be well to watch these two young lawyers arrayed against the admitted masters of their craft.

She lithe and unknown Corbett sent the invincible John L. Sullivan to oblivion. Brian du Bois Gilbert was unhorsed by Wilfred of Ivanhoe. Theodore Roosevelt ran second in a Presidential race.

Who knows?

Another in our series of new transcriptions of contemporary articles on the Leo Frank case.

Atlanta Journal
July 29^th, 1913

QUESTIONS DIRECTED AT NEGRO INDICATED AN EFFORT TO THROW SUSPICION UPON WATCHMAN

“We Might as Well Begin to Show the Negro a Criminal Now as Later,” Declared Attorney Rosser, In Arguing for Admissability of His Questions—Negro Was Taken Over His Testimony Many Times in Effort to Break Him Down

INDICATIONS TUESDAY ARE THAT TRIAL WILL LAST MANY DAYS, PROBABLY AS LONG AS TWO WEEKS

Morning Session Enlivened by Clashes Between Attorneys, Every Point Is Bitterly Contested—Frank Keeps Serene and Untroubled Throughout Session—Full Story of Testimony Given by Witnesses During the Morning

After a luncheon recess of an hour and a half Tuesday the trial of Leo M. Frank was resumed at 2 p. m. with Police Sergeant L. S. Dobbs still on the witness stand. The morning session was given over to the continued examination of Newt Lee, the negro night watchman, and the direct and cross examination of Sergeant Dobbs.

There were frequent clashes between the attorneys for the defense and the solicitor during the morning. Every point was bitterly contested, and once the jury was sent from the room while the lawyers argued the fine points of the law. It was evident that the case was to be fought at every point.

The most significant feature of the morning session was an intimation by Attorneys Rosser and Arnold, counsel for Frank, that they might seek to connect the negro nigh watchman with the murder. It was during a colloquy between the lawyers for the defense and the state relative to the admissibility of the negro’s testimony as to what was said to him by the police officers about the contents of the notes found beside Mary Phagan’s body.

Solicitor Dorsey made the point that the notes had not yet been introduced as evidence and unless the defense was seeking to impeach the witness or to connect him with the crime it was not proper for him to questioned concerning the contents of the notes.

Then Attorney Rosser declared: “We’ve got to commence somewhere and at some time to show the negro is a criminal and we might as well begin here as anywhere else.”

Attorney Arnold made the point that the negro’s comment on the contents of the note immediately after they were read to him indicated a previous knowledge of them.

No further effort, however, was made to connect Lee with the murder. The negro was on the stand altogether just four hours and forty-five minutes. The tedious and detailed examination of his witness indicated that every point in the case would be hard fought by both sides. He was led back and forth over the same ground, it being the evident intention of the defense to discredit his statements relating to unusual agitation on the part of Frank on the day of the murder.

Sergeant Dobbs’ testimony concerned the finding of the girl’s body, and the two notes which were picked up near it. Also the condition of the body when found.

During Tuesday afternoon other officers will probably be introduced to give similar evidence, and it is believed the undertaker, who prepared the body for burial, will also be put on the stand.

Court officials believe how that the trial will run well into a second week and that James Conley, the negro sweeper, will be on the stand for two or three days. It is not known when the state will call Conley, but he will doubtless be the climax witness and all the energies of the defense will be directed toward breaking him down.

Frank followed the progress of his trial Tuesday with great interest and apparent satisfaction. He listened intently to everything said in the court room and frequently he conferred with his attorneys. He often smiled while conversing with his wife and mother who sat beside him.

About fifty spectators retained their seats in the court room throughout the recess, foregoing lunch and fresh air in order to insure for themselves good seats at the afternoon session. Mrs. Frank and her husband lunched together in an ante-room of the court. The jury returned form [sic] lunch and a short walk at 1:50 o’clock.

Court reconvened three minutes early, at 1:57 Sergeant Dobbs continued to the stand. He was asked a few questions in cross-examination by Attorney Rosser and then Solicitor Dorsey took up the re-direct examination. The solicitor brought out additional points about the finding of the body. He stressed the fact that the trimming of the girl’s had never has been found so far as the sergeant knows. Sergeant Dobbs identified some blue ribbon as the same that was on Mary Phagan’s hair when her body was found.

DOBBS’ TESTIMONY.

The solicitor read a transcript of the testimony given by Sergeant Dobbs before the coroner’s jury relating to the indications that Mary Phagan’s body had been dragged.

The transcript was right, said the sergeant. The dragging seemed to have started at the corner of the elevator shaft. Using Mary Phagan’s umbrella as a pointer, the solicitor had the sergeant trace the line of the dragging marks.

It showed that the body had been taken out of the elevator and pulled around the corner of the elevator shaft under the ladder. By this testimony the solicitor evidently expected to lay his plan for combatting the possible theory that the defense might advance that the body was taken down the ladder itself.

The solicitor asked the sergeant if it would be possible for a man to carry the body down the ladder. It was hard for man to go down by himself, said the sergeant, and no ordinary man could have carried the body down.

The solicitor then asked the sergeant about a photograph of the rear door of the basement. The photograph appeared in the same frame with the diagram. The photograph showed the hasp in place and the bar across the back of the door.

Sergeant Dobbs said that the bar was in that position when he saw the door, but that the hasp was pulled out and the lock was lying on a platform immediately at the right. The bar evidently did not interfere with the opening of the door, for the door slides and does not swing.

Sergeant Dobbs said that the hasp was not bent and evidently had been pulled straight out. He identified the lock and hasp themselves, the solicitor handing them to him.

The sergeant stated that the body was cold when he found it. He identified the low-quarter shoes. One of them, said he, was on one foot of the body and the other was found on the trash pile near the boiler.

The dead girl’s hands were folded across her breast (beneath her body.) The body was rather stiff, bue [sic] he could work the fingers at the joints.

Leo M. Frank, the accused, was reported to have been sleeping soundly when the deputies went up to awake him in the jail Tuesday morning to take him to court for the second day of his trial.

Frank arrived at court, under charge of Sheriff Mangum, very shortly after 7 o’clock, and his breakfast was brought to him there from his home.

A crowd of several hundred people was gathered around the doors of the court house at 8:30 o’clock.

Mrs. Leo M. Frank, the wife of the accused, and his mother, Mrs. Ray Frank, of Brooklyn, appeared together in the court room about fifteen minutes before the trial was due to resume. Judge Roan, presiding, arrived shortly after them and went into the seclusion of his chambers. Lawyers for both sides arrived at five minutes to 9 o’clock.

Frank entered court at 8:50 o’clock and resumed his seat between his mother and his wife.

LEE RESUMES TESTIMONY.

Judge Roan went upon the bench at 9 o’clock and convened court. The jury brought in and Newt Lee, the negro night watchman on the stand at adjournment Monday afternoon, was recalled to the witness chair.

Just before court was convened, the doors were opened for a few moments and the crowd surged in until the 250 seats in the room were filled, leaving a hundred or more disappointed people outside the doors, which then were shut.

Attorney R. R. Arnold examined the diagram of the pencil factory which the state introduced Monday.

Attorney Rosser resumed his cross-questioning of Newt Lee.

For the first half hour of this interrogation Mr. Rosser sought to develop from the negro just how close he got to the dust bin before he saw the body. He wanted the negro to estimate in feet, which the negro was reluctant to do. Referring to measure distances by object or persons in the court room. The negro did estimate distances in feet, however, qualifying his estimates by “about”.

Mr. Rosser evidently was endeavoring to make the negro admit that he could not [1 word illegible] the dust bin from the toilet, [1 world illegible] he would have found it necessary [1 word illegible] closer in order to see into the bin. As a result of the cross-questioning, the witness said that after he left the toilet he raised the lantern above his head and walked four or five feet toward the dust bin. He was then a good way from the body.

WITNESS BECOMES NETTLED.

When he first saw the feet of the body, the negro declared, he did not believe it was a body lying there. He then was scanning the dust bin to see if there was any fire there.

Mr. Rosser asked him a number of questions as to why he did not look into the dust bin on his former trips to the basement that night, and questioned him also at considerable length as to the relative location of the dust bin and the toilet, asking if it was not true that the dust bin was not considerably at his right at the end of a partition. The negro became nettled at Mr. Rosser’s insistent questioning on this point, and rising to his feet and clapping his hands he declared, “I’m going to tell you just like it is.”

He then explained that the dust bin was diagonally opposite where he stood and in plain view.

Mr. Rosser asked him how far it was from the trap door to the dust bin.

“Isn’t it about 125 feet?”

The negro said he didn’t know, but it was a long way.

Mr. Rosser asked the negro why on his preceding trips into the basement that night he did not go farther back than the ladder. He had gone farther back, said the negro—twenty-five feet or so.

“On this particular trip you went back beyond the toilet, didn’t you?”

The negro said yes, that he would have gone father than he did if he hadn’t seen the body. He walked up close to the body with his lantern over his head. He wanted to see, he said, if it was an “natural” body. He didn’t know but what it might have been an “unnatural” body.

He didn’t know how long he looked at it, he said, before he went to call the police. He didn’t stand there ten minutes, or five.

“I LIT ER RAG.”

“Two minutes?” “I don’t know, sir.” “Two seconds?” “I don’t know, sir, but I’ll tell you the truth. I held up my lantern and looked good and just as quick as I found out it was a natural body I lit er rag!” The bailiffs rapped for order in court.

The face of the body was “all dirty,” said the negro. Several white spots showed through the dirt, however, and the body’s hair was “frizzly.” He realigned at once that it was a white person, said he, and hurried away. He led the police to the basement and showed them the body by their electric searchlights, said he.

He didn’t know how long it was until the police decided it was a white girl. They arrested him right away, said he, and sent him upstairs. Before that, however, he heard one of the officers say, “This is just a child. She must have been killed two or three days.”

He didn’t remember whether they carried him back to the basement any more that morning. Some days later the officers took hi[m] from police station to the basement. The negro didn’t notice whether the rear basement door was open when the officers came. He was positive that it was not open earlier in the night.

The negro, describing the position of the body, declared that the girl was lying on her back with her head turned over so that the left side of her face was up. He saw blood, he said, on the left side of her head.

The attorney cross-examined the negro on his statements made at the coroner’s inquest, and examined the negro for half an hour or more with the evident purpose of discrediting Lee’s testimony of Monday afternoon relative to Frank being arrested on the afternoon of April 26.

TILT IN COUNSEL.

This examination led to a lively tilt of the opposing attorneys. Attorney Rosser was reading from the record of the coroner’s inquest on Lee’s testimony regarding Frank’s actions when he first saw J. M. Gantt at the door of the factory that afternoon. According to the record as read by Mr. Rosser, Lee did not say at the coroner’s inquest that Frank jumped back but did say that he looked frightened. At the inquest, according to Mr. Rosser’s reading, Lee did say that he supposed Frank was frightened because he had fired Gantt from the position of bookkeeper.

Mr. Rosser wanted the witness to repeat that remark. Solicitor Dorsey was objecting immediately. It was a matter of opinion, said the solicitor, and when the negro expressed that opinion he did not know what he, Dorsey, now knows, and what the jury will know. After the attorneys had wrangled for some fifteen minutes over the point, Attorney Rosser turning to the counsel for the state said:

“I want to accommodate my young friends whenever I can.”

Attorney Hooper, who was sitting down, remarked, “Well, you’ve got to accommodate me on this.”

“No, I haven’t,” said Mr. Rosser.

“Yes you have,” returned Hooper.

“The man hasn’t been born that I’ve got to accommodate,” retorted Mr. Rosser. After registering a strenuous objection that Mr. Dorsey had tried to lecture him, Mr. Rosser proceeded. Judge Roan ruled that the negro’s opinion was inadmissible. Mr. Rosser read the opinion, however, without getting an answer from the negro upon it.

LEE DENIES RECORD.

Newt Lee, the witness, took vigorous issue with the record.

“Boss, I can’t help what they write there,” said he. “I’m telling all I know about this.”

Mr. Rosser then went back to the finding of the body and read the record on that, wherein it appeared that when Lee realized it was a body he leaped from where he stood and went up the ladder. The negro demurred at that way of putting it, prefer[r]ing to say that he “lit out.”

Mr. Rosser called the negro’s attention to the fact as he stated it that nowhere in the record of the coroner’s inquest did he state that it took Frank twice as long on Saturday to put the tape on the time clock as it had on a previous occasion. Lee contended that he had told the coroner’s jury that it took “longer,” but Mr. Rosser couldn’t find that in the record. The negro said nobody asked him at the inquest to make a comparative statement.

The negro appeared to be holding his own remarkably well under the rigid cross-examination by Mr. Rosser. He argued with the attorney without hesitancy, and took open issue with the inquest record whenever the attorney contended that it conflicted in minor ways with his testimony in court.

THE NOTES.

Mr. Rosser asked Lee if he was in the basement when the police found some notes beside Mary Phagan. Before Lee could reply to the question Solicitor Dorsey objected. The notes themselves would be the best evidence on that point, he said.

Attorney Rosser argued that he wanted to show Lee’s ready interpretation of these notes. What Lee said is not admissible, returned Mr. Dorsey, because Lee himself was not on trial.

Attorney Reuben Arnold for the first time since the trial began spoke up in court. If Lee had made damaging admissions, he argued to the court, they would be relevant and admissible.

Before the court could rule, the solicitor asked that the jury be taken out of court so the question could be argued. If evidence tending to involve Lee had to come before the jury, said he, he wanted it to come in the shape of admissible evidence and not from the argument of opposing attorneys and “in the right way.” The jury was taken out. This was the first time the jury had left court.

Attorney Arnold addressing the court, contended that any substance or fact connected with the witness Newt Lee, which would show that he had something to do with the killing, is admissible. Although the night watchman admits having discovered the body, and late at night at that, he denies all previous knowledge of the crime and says that two notes were found by the body. The meaning of these notes, said Mr. Arnold, is obscure and doubtful.

ARNOLD READS NOTES.

“We expect to show that the witness testified that two notes were found,” said he. “That the officers endeavored to read them to him and that they were obscure in meaning. One of them read this way. ‘He said he would love me. Laid down. Play like the night witch did it, but that long tall black negro did it by his self.’

“The man who wrote that note was trying to lay the crime on a long tall black negro. It was a clumsy effort to exculpate some other man. As soon as the words ‘night witch’ were read to the witness, he spoke and said ‘That means me. I’m the nightwatchman.’ This shows that the negro had knowledge of these notes. On the stand here he has appeared very dense and ignorant. Mr. Rosser has been compelled to question him at great length to bring out the slightest fact. In this instance, however, he interprets this note in a second and half.”

Solicitor Dorsey was asked by the judge to restate his objection to this.

“This conversation, your honor,” said the solicitor, “occurred between this witness and somebody else. Even had it been with Frank, the defendant, it would not be admissible. He is asked if a man did not read a note to him. The defense concedes that it was a note. They have got this note in their hands at this moment. I contend that it is not admissible to go into the contents of any paper, as the paper itself is the highest and best evidence, and no such paper has been introduced at this trial.

“It is not proper for the defense to attempt to go into the contents of this note by this witness. Such a course would not be proper except for the purpose of impeaching the witness and even then it is necessary to have the highest and best evidence—which is the note itself.”

HOOPER SPEAKS.

Attorney Hooper, for the state, cited a case to show that the question would be inadmissible.

“If they undertake as they have indicated here,” said he, “to put the crime on somebody else, that would put a different aspect on the matter. But until they do drain their guns on some third party, no such evidence can be admitted.”

Attorney Rosser replied by saying:

“Your honor, we’ve got to commence somewhere to show him as a criminal. We can commence here as well as anywhere else.”

Solicitor Dorsey insisted that the defense, through the line of questions put to the negro, was seeking to put the notes in evidence. This was denied by Attorney Rosser. The defense simply is using the notes to refresh its memory, said he, and to suggest questions for the witness.

JUDGE ROAN’S RULE.

Judge Roan ruled that anything was admissible which tended to show that this witness expressed anxiety or trepidation. While ruling that the cross-examination could proceed as begun by the defense, he announced that he would not permit the defense to go into the contents of the notes. The judge said further that it is for the jury to interpret the conduct of the witness. The jury was brought back and the cross-examination was resumed.

Mr. Rosser, reading from the note, asked Lee:

“Didn’t one of the police begin to read this from the note: ‘The tall black slim negro did this. He will try to lay it on the night’—and when he got that far didn’t you say, ‘Boss, that’s me?’”

Solicitor Dorsey again objected, but Judge Roan held against him.

Lee asserted emphatically that he did not exclaim, “Boss, that’s me.” He said that he did say, “Somebody must have been trying to put it off on me.”

This concluded the cross-examination of the negro.

On redirect examination, Solicitor General Dorsey asked:

“Did you ever know Jim Conley?”

“I met him the first time in jail the other day.”

“Did anybody try to put this off on you?”

“No, sir.”

“Did Mr. Frank ever try to put it off on you?”

The question was objected to by the defense, and the judge ruled for the defense.

“Whom have you talked to about this crime?” continued Mr. Dorsey.

“I talked to you and to some of the officers.”

“Did you ever talk to Mr. Arnold here?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did you know that he was an attorney for Mr. Frank?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did you ever decline to talk to anybody about this?”

“No.”

“Have you ever tried to conceal anything?”

“No.”

Mr. Dorsey then brought from the negro the statement that Frank had remarked on the length of time it took him to fix the tape on the clock the second time and that was the reason the negro claimed to remember the incident.

About twenty minutes were consumed in the examination of a diagram of the building which the solicitor offered, the negro identifying parts of the picture.

THAT “THIRD DEGREE.”

Resuming the cross examination of Lee, Attorney Rosser brought out from him again the location of the laboratories and machines, etc. In the rear of the second floor of the factory. The attorney questioned him also about the basement and its lighting conditions. Mr. Rosser questioned him about his treatment since arrest—who questioned him, how they dealt with him, etc.

Lee denied vehemently that the police had discharged a pistol close to his head to frighten him. Mr. Rosser asked him if the police hadn’t cursed and abused him, and even prayed for him.

“Well, they never prayed much,” answered the negro. Attorney Rosser then asked him if the detectives didn’t question him continuously, one after another, and drive him almost crazy. “They didn’t get much sleep for a few days after I was arrested,” answered the negro. “As soon as I would lay down, somebody would call me and start in to questioning me.”

Mr. Rosser asked him about interviews with detectives, singly and in pairs or greater numbers; particularly about one said to have taken place in the jail recently when he was present with Jim Conley, Attorney Hooper, Solicitor Dorsey and Detectives Campbell and Starnes. Lee said that for the first two days in jail he was bothered all the time with questions, but after that he was left alone, and after the inquest he was willing to stay in jail because he wasn’t molested much.

Solicitor Dorsey asked the negro if Mr. Frank talked to him in the county jail.

“No, sir.”

THROUGH WITH LEE.

Lee was excused then by both sides. A deputy sheriff started with him back to the county jail. “I never want to get up there again,” said the negro, referring to the witness stand.

SERGEANT DOBBS ON STAND.

Police Sergeant L. S. Dobbs followed Newt Lee to the stand. He related how on Sunday morning, April 27, about 3:25 o’clock a call was received at police headquarters about the murder at the pencil factory.

He, in company with Sergeant Brown, Call Officer Anderson, Britt Craig, a newspaper reporter, and W. W. Rogers, rushed to the factory in Rogers’ automobile.

Arriving at the factory, they found the front door locked. About two minutes after they knocked, the negro, Newt Lee, came down and opened it. The negro told them a dead woman was in the basement, and led them down through the scuttle hole and down a ladder into the basement. There was a gas light burning dimly at the ladder.

The negro led the officers about 150 feet back toward the rear of the basement. Just in the rear of a board partition on the left, the negro pointed out a body lying on the ground. The body was that of a girl, lying on its face with the left side on the ground and the right side raised slightly.

The sergeant couldn’t tell at first glance whether the body was that of a negro girl or a white girl. He noticed the dark hair on the head. He turned the body over. The face was covered with dirt and dust. With a clean piece of paper he wiped the dirt from the one side of the face and saw that the body evidently was that of a white girl.

DESCRIBES WOUNDS.

To satisfy himself further as to the color of the body, the sergeant said he raised the skirt just above the left knee and saw that the skin was white. He noticed on the face where he had wiped it several slight wounds such as might have been made by the “picking” of a pocket knife.

A large cord was around the neck. The end of the cord trailed from the right side of the throat. This cord was drawn tight and had sunk deep into the flesh. A ruffle torn evidently from some underclothing was tied also around the neck but not so tightly as the cord.

There was a bruise on the right side of the head. Apparently it had been made by a blow. The hair was matted with blood. Sergeant Dobbs continued that after examining the body he called Lee, the night watchman, and questioned him about the matter, accusing him of having committed the crime or of knowing something about it.

He asked the negro how he happened to find the body in the dark basement. Solicitor Dorsey stopped the witness at this point and directed him not to give any hearsay evidence—to tell only what he saw himself.

“I looked around to see what I could find,” said the witness, “and discovered a couple of notes.”

Picking up some documents from his table, the solicitor started to hand them to him but changed his mind. He picked up a cord and some other articles which had been placed on the witness stand and asked Sergeant Dobbs:

“Have you ever seen this cord before?”

IDENTIFIES CORD.

The witness identified it as the cord which he found around the dead girl’s neck.

The solicitor held out his arm and had the witness loop the cord around his wrist and explain to the jury just how it was tied around the girl’s neck. The witness called attention to the slip knot in the cord. He also identified the strip of ruffle which was found around her neck.

There was not a great deal of blood on the head and hair, said he. The blood on the outside of the hair was dry, but down close to the scalp it was moist. The place where the body was found was damp.

The solicitor handed to him some documents which were identified by Sergeant Dobbs as the two notes and the tablet he had found near the body. The notes were enclosed in celluloid covers, front and back, with tape holding the covers together at the edges.

Sergeant Dobbs said that he did not know who the dead girl was, when first he saw the body. Later, said he, he learned that it was Mary Phagan. He described the position of the body, saying that the head was pointing toward the front of the building and was close to the partition.

The notes, said he, both were found under the sawdust near the head. Scratching around with his stick, he uncovered them. The tablet was just a few inches from the notes. He ordered that Lee be taken to the station house and locked up, said the sergeant.

He said that Newt Lee was cool and calm when he saw him first and that at no time did the negro seem to be excited. His attention was called to the diagram of the factory interior, produced Monday by the solicitor, and he pointed out the position of the body when he found it.

After Sergeant Dobbs had identified the diagram, Attorney Rosser took up the cross-examination. For the defense, Mr. Rosser questioned him closely as to the demeanor of Newt Lee when the police arrived, and Sergeant Dobbs repeated that the negro was calm.

SCRATCHED FOR NOTES

He did not remember saying at the inquest that the negro seemed to be very excited, he said. Mr. Rosser stressed the point that the sergeant had found the notes only after raking his stick through the sawdust.

He also brought out the fact that there was considerable trash, a number of pieces of paper, and several pencils, lying around in the basement. One of the girl’s shoes and her hat had been found, said the sergeant, on a trash pile in front of the boiler.

In reply to questions Sergeant Dobbs declared that it looked to him as if the body had been dragged on its face. There was a trail in the dirt leading from the elevator to the point where the body was found, he said; and in addition the face looked as if someone had dragged the body, holding its feet.

Mr. Rosser asked the witness if he was certain that this trail led from the elevator, and when the witness answered “yes,” he read the record of the coroner’s inquest wherein the sergeant had testified, he said, that the trail led from the corner near the ladder.

Mr. Rosser questioned him regarding the police test of Lee’s ability to see the body from the point at which he claimed to have been standing when he first spied it. Sergeant Dobbs said that it was possible to see the “bulk” of the body, but would have been difficult if the person had not been looking directly for some object.

Attorney Rosser brought out the fact that there was blood on the girl’s underclothing and that this blood was dry; also that the blood on her face was dry, but moist at the roots of the hair on the scalp.

The sergeant admitted that he found the finger joints of the body movable. The staple on the back door looked as if it recently had been pulled out.

COURT TAKES RECESS.

Attorney Rosser developed from the witness the statement that when he reached the word “night” in reading one of the notes, Newt Lee exclaimed, “That means the night watchman.” The witness declared that the strip of underclothing around the girl’s neck was over, not under, the cord. At this point Attorney Rosser completed his cross-examination, and at 12:30 o’clock the court recessed until 2 o’clock.

Another in our series of new transcriptions of contemporary articles on the Leo Frank case.

Atlanta Georgian
July 29^th, 1913

Outwardly Quiet and Singularly Lacking in Excitement, Frank Trial is Enactment of Grim Drama.

By JAMES B. NEVIN.

One of the most commonplace things in the world—crime—is riveting the attention of Atlanta and Georgia to-day.

Crime is almost as commonplace as death—and yet death, in a thousand ways, never is commonplace at all.

If I were a stranger in Atlanta and should walk into the courthouse where Leo Frank is being tried for the murder of Mary Phagan, doubtless I should be utterly astounded to discover what I had walked into.

That pale-faced, slight, boyish-looking party over there—the one sitting beside the massive frame of Luther Z. Rosser and the well-groomed person of Reuben Arnold—I should be shocked, I am sure, to learn that he stands charged with one of the blackest, most inhuman and most unspeakable crimes in all Georgia’s somewhat long and varied catalogue of crime.

Yet that is the truth—Leo Frank is answering to the charge of the Grand Jury, and he has pleaded not guilty.

Crime and wrongdoing began, of course, when Mother Eve, through no motive other than curiosity, and without malice aforethought, either expressed or implied, bit a small and toothsome morsel from the first apple.

Cain performed the first murder not so very long afterward.

There were no newspapers in those days, but a well-authenticated story of those first infractions of the law have come down to us—and to-day crime runs riot throughout all the world!

Here in Atlanta, thousands of years after Cain committed the primary murder in history, Leo Frank is answering to the charge of killing Mary Phagan, some three months ago.

Frank Calm, Unagitated.

There sits the judge, and over yonder the jury. Pale of long confinement in jail, calm, unagitated, and even smiling, sits Leo Frank, the defendant.

Beside him are his devoted wife and his mother—his mother, who would as soon believe the stars had ceased to move in their orbits as to believe—even to suspect—that her boy was ever so remotely concerned in the death of Mary Phagan.

Over on the other side, however, all the relatives of Mary Phagan—those who are not under the rule and debarred from the courtroom. They are grim and unsmiling—they are invoking the law’s sternest displeasure upon whoever it was that took the life of their innocent little one!

Many and varied must be the emotions surging within the hearts and souls of these people, notwithstanding their outward poise—but I, who am theoretically a stranger in Atlanta’s courtroom for the moment, still am wondering what it all can be about.

Gradually I realize a tenseness in the atmosphere, perhaps—and there may steal over me, as I grope mentally for something to fasten upon, a feeling that, after all, tragedy is in the air, and that its sinister shadow has fallen athwart this courtroom, the while I still recall that outside the sunshine is very bright, and is beaming upon the just and the unjust, impartially and alike.

One of the world’s truly great physicians says “death is never uninteresting,” and that no really great physician possibly can find it so.

He may become used to it, he may grow to view the mere physical fact of death itself as not a particularly astounding phenomenon, but never does he see in any one death the same sequenced things he has observed in others.

It is much the same way with crime, I think.

Murder is as old as the hills—as old as laughter, love, and the hate of hell—but it never loses its repugnant appeal—and so, all Atlanta and all Georgia to-day is watching the progress of the Frank trial, because Atlanta and Georgia are made up of human beings—that’s all!

Few Women Present.

There are few women attending the trial of Frank. If there were thousands, however, one alone and above all other would stand forth and challenge the attention of the spectators. I mean, of course, Frank’s wife.

There isn’t anything the least bit “weepy” or downcast about her. She’s a woman—the accused man’s wife—but she plainly is a most extraordinary woman, nevertheless.

Whatever her thoughts, and whatever she expects of this trial, she gives no sign. She counsels freely with her husband’s lawyers, but not frequently. She leans over and whispers something into Frank’s ear now and then, but not often. She smiles upon him, and occasionally she runs her hand lightly along his shoulder, and maybe her arm is around his neck for the fitting fraction of a second, but if any of it is for effect or the least spectacular or theatrical, she is a consummate artist and surpassingly adroit.

Somehow she gave me the impression of the wife affectionate, but not demonstrative, of the wife unafraid but not obtrusive, of the wife deeply concerned, but too proud to let it be seen any more than it must be.

Perhaps there is a subtle motive in her quiet and repressed movements in the courtroom now and then—if so, I can but admire the complete perfectness of her methods and the dramatic excellence of her role as she enacts it.

Looking there at Leo Frank’s wife and then at Leo Frank, one unconsciously finds himself asking himself this all-important question: What could have been Frank’s motive when he killed Mary Phagan, if it be possible that he could have performed that monstrous deed?

Far and away the most frequent thing encountered in the unraveling of murder cases is the eternal triangle—the man, the wife, and the other woman!

That “other woman” may be an angel, she may be a devil; she may be a princess, she may be a pauper; she may be an innocent child, she may be a faded courtesan; she may be a willing third party, and she may be the most unwilling—but too often she is there, in some aspect, when murder has been done!

Could the motive behind the murder of Mary Phagan have been an unrighteous infatuation upon the part of Frank toward the dead girl—an unholy infatuation repelled to the extent of bringing about murder itself?

Was it that? And if it wasn’t that, what was it?

Unless there was malicious motive and intent behind the slaying of Mary Phagan, there has been no murder done. The law says that malice is as essential to murder as oxygen is to the breath of life.

Frank? Of all the defendants ever saw arraigned, Leo Frank, I think, he looks the least the part of a murderer!

Not that that means anything whatever conclusively—but it is a thought that must obtrude itself upon all who view him there in the courthouse, battling in his own way for his life and liberty.

Frank never could be made to look the part of a hero, no more than he can be made to look the part of a villain—and yet he might be either, and deceive his looks no more than hundreds have done before his time and will do hereafter.

If someone should have told me that Frank is a bookworm, or a collector of postage stamps, or a person with a fad for pottering around in the garden at early morn, it never should have occurred to me to doubt it.

But Frank a murderer, a thing lost to every sense of decency and right, a traitor to his dearest and nearest, a—well, I should have asked explanations and enlightenment as to detail!

And yet, if Frank be the thing charged in that bill of indictment, he must be all of those sinister things combined.

Is he? Frankly, I have no fixed opinion, and I am of open mind.

The sweetest-tempered play-fellow otherwise I ever had when I was a boy had a marked passion fo[r] sneaking off by himself and robbing birds’ nests, particularly when [t]he young birds were in the nests!

One Touch of the Dramatic.

There has been so far in the trial of Leo Frank but one touch of the genuinely dramatic—properly designated melodramatic, perhaps—and that was when the clothing little Mary Phagan wore when murdered was exhibited to the jury.

This, of course, was one of the tricks of the trade, and it was indulged in entirely for the jury’s benefit.

It is not unusual—the same thing happens in all murder trials, and I have wondered why it could happen save for the doubtful effect of it desired.

To be sure, the sweet and innocent cause of this trial—the pathetic victim prerequisite to it—is, of all the parties to it, save one, absent.

She may be there in spirit, comforting and sustaining her grief-stricken mother, but her voice is not heard, and never will or can be heard.

She is not in the courtroom, and the one other extreme of the tragedy—omitting the yet undetermined status of Frank—is over yonder in the Tower—Conley.

In the grewsome exhibition of Mary Phagan’s clothing, just as it was removed from her dead body, there was a power of appeal hardly to be described in words. The youthful garments spoke eloquently, if inconclusively, of the deceased—the unoffending, methodical, carefree little working girl, so suddenly and so frightfully thrust into public notice, never to know what it all was about.

If within the person of Mary Phagan dwelt the awful propelling force of motive that promoted Frank or someone else to murder, her simple clothing there in the courtroom suggested wonderfully clear the pathos of it and the inhumanity.

And there must have been a motive! What was it about Mary Phagan that gave rise to it in the heart and mind of—Frank?

The things that have happened so far in the trial of Frank are relatively inconsequential, as concerns the verdict.

Battle of Wits.

Two conclusions stand out unmistakably—the trial is to be a battle of legal wits, and it is to rage most fiercely about the negro Jim Conley—the big, black and all-meaning factor yet held jealously in the background.

Mr. Dorsey, the Solicitor General, evidently feels the strain of his position. He is plainly nervous at times and unmistakably irritable now and then. He snaps his points to the court, and sometimes borders almost upon the rough and querelous in his language.

Undoubtedly Mr. Rosser disconcerts and irritates the Solicitor continuously. At times Mr. Dorsey’s objections have seemed more like complaints—and when Mr. Rosser turns his massive head around and stage whispers additional words not to Dorsey’s liking, he resents it in every sentence and gesture he offers by way of comment or reply.

Reuben Arnold has had little to say so far, but he is forever whispering something into Rosser’s ear—Rosser frowning like a thundercloud the while he listens.

Mr. Rosser is fighting his way along cautiously and carefully. He seemed upon the point almost of browbeating Newt Lee more than once, as that darky’s examination proceeded, but generally he quit just short of actual performance.

Lee, too, was unconsciously outspoken in his resentment of the Rosser treatment, and more than once scored well and powerful in reply to Mr. Rosser’s questions—particularly when couching his replies in quaint and curious negro illustrations and phrases.

If at times Lee became more or less confused and contradictory, he proved in the main to be something of a Tartar under cross-examination, and while his testimony as a whole could not amount to much as an isolated proposition and is valuable only as one link in a long chain yet to be forged about Frank, it nevertheless went to the jury in pretty good shape, and will be hard to discount, whatever it may be worth.

Hooper Singularly Calm.

But if Dorsey is agitated and irritable, and if Rosser is imposing and pugnacious, and if Arnold is keyed to a high pitch and continuously prompting his associate counsel, the other big figure among the attorneys, Frank Hooper, is as calm as a May morning, smiling, dispassionate and altogether at his ease.

Hooper looks as if he had just stepped out of a cold storage bandbox.

Handsome, as he certainly is, if not of particularly commanding presence, and well dressed, he moves about with all the unconscious grace and ease of a—panther?

Hardly that, and yet—Frank Hooper may loom larger than any attorney in this case before the final word is written in respect of it.

There is no doubt that the trial is to be long drawn out. Every inch is being disputed pro and con, and every possible point is being raised to keep the case strictly within its legal bounds.

The jury apparently is much above the average—it was plain enough all along that the defense was seeking a jury of high intelligence, and a city jury, moreover.

I think the jury trying Leo Frank may be expected to record the truth of the trial—it appears to be composed of level-headed, clean cut, sensible men, as it should be, if it is to give a fair play to all parties concerned.

The climax of the fight, of course, will be entirely within Jim Conley. The State will make every possible effort to sustain him, and the defense will make every possible effort to break him down.

Luther Rosser will exhaust his remarkable resourcefulness in this mighty effort, aided and abetted, to the very limit by the subtle and incisive art of Reuben Arnold.

Frank Hooper will strive as he never before has striven to hold Conley together—and Huge Dorsey will back him with all the experience of his career at the criminal bar.

A happy and reassuring circumstance it that over and above all these contending forces sits Judge Roan—unruffled, unafraid, of unblemished and unquestioned integrity, upright and just—to hold all the stormy elements eventually in order and within the rules of the law.

The real trial of Leo Frank hardly yet has begun!

The Atlanta Georgian

Sunday, July 20, 1913

Attorneys Rosser and Arnold, in a Statement to the Press, Make Bitter Attack on Solicitor for His Conduct of Phagan Case.

Call Attention to Secrecy Maintained by Prosecution, and Declare Action of State’s Attorney Has Inflamed Public Opinion.

Luther Z. Rosser and Reuben R. Arnold, attorneys for Leo M. Frank, who will be tried July 29 on the charge of killing Mary Phagan, joined Saturday in a bitter attack upon the policy of Solicitor Hugh M. Dorsey, whose procedure in the case, they said, had inflamed public opinion and had placed the Solicitor far below the dignity of his office.

In a formal statement, they charged that Dorsey had ignored his constitutional and legal functions and had sought to usurp those of the Grand Jury by his attempt to block the indictment of Jim Conley by that body.

They described his action as unprecedented and dangerous in the extreme, and represented Dorsey and Conley as partners in “a harmonious concert.”

The document, which is one of the few public statements issued by the defense, is bristling with criticism of the Solicitor’s conduct throughout the investigation of the murder mystery, and charges that Dorsey has maintained his belief in Frank’s guilt apparently for no other purpose than to convict Frank.

Call Attention to Secrecy.

Attention is called to the secrecy with which evidence is being gathered by the prosecution “in manufacturing its case against Frank,” as though an innocent man—as the law contemplates Frank until he is proved guilty—should not be given the advantage of a knowledge of every shred of evidence which may be found for or against him, so that it may be presented, if favorable, and that it may be met and disproved if false.

Disclaiming any intention of criticising the previous Grand Jury, Attorneys Rosser and Arnold cite the circumstance of Conley’s first confession, into which he was forced by the discovery that he could write after he steadfastly had denied he could, and asserted that the Solicitor had been asked to bring this incident to the attention of the Grand Jury, but that he, if report were true, actually directed that it be not done.

Another indication of the Solicitor’s alleged domination over the Grand Jury was contained, said the attorneys for the defense, in his reported action in insisting that the jurors pledge themselves not to act in any way on the suggested Conley indictment during his absence on a vacation.

Statement of Defense.

The statement, in full, follows:

Counsel for Leo M. Frank have refrained from making a statement for the papers except under strong provocation. Clearly counsel on both sides should refrain from any comment of or criticism on any action of the Grand Jury to be taken at its meeting next Monday, which might tend to hamper or limit the Grand Jury in their action upon the Conley case.

The Grand Jury is an independent body; it is under the control of no one.

A Solicitor General is the adviser of that body as to legal principles merely, but he has no right to exercise any sort of control in determining who shall or shall not be indicted.

To permit a Solicitor General to use the position intrusted to him by the people to decide for himself who shall and who shall not be indicted is a danger too great to be contemplated.

Reply to Solicitor.

With this preliminary statement we reluctantly make a reply to Solicitor Dorsey’s interview in this morning’s paper.

It is rather remarkable that the Solicitor General and a person admitting complicity in a grave crime should get together in such harmonious concert of action as these two interviews show.

Mr. Dorsey admits that the indictment of Conley will have only a “mild but undesirable effect on the state’s case against Leo M. Frank.”

Ought the solicitor general for one moment to be influenced in his advice to the grand jury by any consideration of the effect upon anybody’s case?

It is not our understanding that the grand jury is organized to aid the solicitor general in his management of cases in court; their function is a higher one. They investigate every case of probable guilt and return an indictment. It could just as well be argued that the indictment of Frank might have had a mild but undesirable effect on Conley’s case in case Conley had been first indicted.

The position of the solicitor general in this case has from the beginning been most remarkable. It has been heretofore understood that the solicitor was to try cases sent to him by the grand jury, but in this case, detective-like, the solicitor is seeking to determine who shall be indicted.

Dorsey Sharply Criticized.

Forgetting his legal and constitutional functions, he is undertaking to control the action of the grand jury.

The citizens of this county elected Mr. Dorsey as solicitor general, but Mr. Dorsey has mistaken the purpose of his election. Evidently he believes that he was elected to be also the grand jury.

The Solicitor General does his duty when he tries to the best of his ability cases sent to him by the grand jury. The solicitor falls far below the dignity of his office when he inflames public opinion thereby inducing a conviction, innocent or guilty.

The solicitor has closed his eyes to these plain truths and has rushed into print day by day proclaiming the guilt of Frank and the innocence of this negro apparently for no purpose but to convict Frank, innocent or guilty, for the gratification of his professional pride.

So far has the state’s counsel forgotten the function of a prosecutor, which is only to ascertain the truth and convict the guilty, that Mr. Dorsey’s detective assistant Chief Lanford in an interview in this morning’s paper, uses the following language as to the Pinkerton Detective Scott and Lanford’s refusal to allow him to see Conley.

Score State’s Secrecy.

“We did not want to embarrass Scott by requesting him to keep silent and did not risk the probability of letting new developments reach Frank’s attorneys, therefore we were forced to prevent him from seeing the negro.”

It seems, therefore, a matter for great endeavor on the part of the state as the solicitor and his associate detective sees it to keep whatever facts they rely upon to convict Frank from the defendant and his attorneys and the public.

If the facts in the solicitor’s possession were the truth, why so much fear as to letting them out? Is it possible that the effort is to ambush the defendant by the proof of circumstances on the trial which he has no opportunity to meet or explain? Is it possible that the state’s object is to keep the defendant in the dark as to the state’s evidence and to so conduct its case that he will have no opportunity to know the facts relied upon to convict him and no opportunity to clearly meet them and disprove them if they be false?

Solicitor’s Action Attacked.

The solicitor has undertaken in this case to hold certain witnesses in custody. He undertook to do this in the case of the negro Conley, but so fearful was he that the negro might dare to tell all he knew that he went through the farce of requesting the superior court to no longer incarcerate Conley and to discharge him and immediately upon obtaining this order of discharge he went through the greater farce of having him loosed upon the streets and then immediately and illegally returning him to the city station house where he now is carefully watched, counselled, and interviewed by the solicitor, his assistant Mr. Hooper, and his detective assistants.

We have no criticism of the former grand jury, but some things happened before it as reported that tend at least to provoke serious inquiry.

When Leo M. Frank’s case was before the grand jury and in the midst of it Conley made his first confession, forced thereto by the discovery that he could write. It was suggested to the solicitor that this confession be brought to the grand jury’s attention. That would have been a fair thing to do. It was not done and rumor has it that Mr. Dorsey directed that it be not done.

One other thing is almost incredible. According to the public prints, when the solicitor wanted a vacation, he was so afraid that the grand jury might act in his absence that he sought to extract a promise from these sworn servants of the State not to indict in his absence.

Question Precedent.

When before was it ever suggested to a Grand Jury that they must await the termination of a pleasure trip before they should indict in any case where indictment was necessary?

Little need be said in reply to lawyer W.M. Smith’s interview given in support of the solicitor’s petition.

It is remarkable that the solicitor has to rely for support upon an argument made by Conley’s counsel. It is, however, appropriate that he should bolster up the solicitor as he depends mightily upon the solicitor to protect his negro, Conley. Conley’s counsel realizes who is Conley’s friend and rushes in print to his rescue.

We are publishing this interview neither in an effort to have Conley indicted nor in an effort to have him not indicted. That is a matter solely for the grand jury. We are not making any appeal to them or to anybody else as to the effect Conley’s indictment would have on the Frank case.

So far as we are concerned we feel that the failure of the Solicitor General to secure an indictment against a confessed accessory to the crime of murder would make far more capital in favor of Frank upon his trial than if he were indicted. We think any jury, and we think any community, would resent the rank favoritism shown this confessed criminal.

LUTHER Z. ROSSER,
R. R. ARNOLD.

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The Atlanta Georgian, July 20th 1913, “Counsel of Frank Says Dorsey Has Sought to Hide Facts,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)

Another in our series of new transcriptions of contemporary articles on the Leo Frank case.

The Atlanta Constitution

Sunday, July 20, 1913

Luther Rosser and Reuben Arnold Declare He Is Going Out of His Way to Dictate to the Grand Jury.

EXCEEDS PROVINCE OF SOLICITOR GENERAL

Grand Jury Will Meet at 10 O’Clock Monday Morning to Take Up Conley Case. Call Is Sent Out.

In reply to Solicitor General Hugh M. Dorsey’s statements in regard to the proposed indictment by the grand jury of James Conley, the negro who has confessed complicity in the murder of Mary Phagan, Attorneys Reuben R. Arnold and Luther Z. Rosser issued a statement Saturday afternoon in which they openly attacked the stand taken by the solicitor in protesting against the indictment of the negro.

That the solicitor is exceeding his legal functions as a state officer is one point that the lawyers defending Leo M. Frank make in their statement, and they also severely criticise the solicitor for his detective work in the Phagan murder.

The card also contains a reference to the statement made in The Constitution Saturday morning by Attorney William M. Smith, representing the negro Conley. The card of the Frank defense takes Attorney Smith to task for rushing to the aid of the solicitor.

Solicitor General Dorsey also issued a statement in which he declared that he no more believed that the grand jury, when it meets Monday, would indict James Conley than he believes that Judge J.T. Pendleton will accede to the request of Frank attorneys to draw the venire for the trial jury from the box containing names of grand jury veniremen.

Roan Out of City.

Judge L.S. Roan, who is to preside at the trial of Frank, which takes place next Monday, a week from tomorrow, will be out of the city during the greater part of this week and has requested Judge Pendleton to draw the veniremen for the trial.

It became known that Judge Pendleton had been requested by the defense to select the veniremen from the grand jury box instead of from the regular petit jury box, and Solicitor Dorsey immediately protested to both Judge Pendleton and Judge Roan.

There are something like 500 names on the grand jury list, and these men are presumably of a decidedly higher class of citizenship than the average among the list of those to be used on trial juries. The Frank defense, in taking that these men be the ones from whom the jurors would be selected, are said to have been working on the theory that a higher class and more intelligent set of men would thus be scored.

Solicitor Dorsey stated, however, that such action would be irregular, and that he was opposed to it. He declared that so far everything connected with the case had been done in the regular way, and that he wished no departure from this, or for Frank to be treated differently from scores of others who have gone on trial for their lives.

When Solicitor Dorsey was pressed for his reasons for stating that he did not believe that Conley would ever be indicted by the grand jury, he declined to enter into an explanation of this.

“Under the situation and considering the circumstances,” he said, “I do not believe that this grand jury or any other would indict the negro.”

Does Not Expect Indictment.

“Do you mean to indicate that the grand jury may return a ‘no’ bill against the negro?” he was asked.

“Well, I’m not discussing that any[…]

Continued on Page Two.

FRANK’S LAWYERS SCORE DORSEY

Continued From Page One.

[…]farther,” he replied, “but I don’t expect Conley’s indictment to result from the meeting.”

The grand jury will meet at 10 o’clock Monday morning to take up the investigation of Conley’s connection with the case. A call was sent out Friday afternoon by the foreman who gave the directions after the solicitor had flatly refused to issue the call.

W.D. Beatie, a real estate operator, who is foreman of the grand jury, also stated to the solicitor that the grand jury wished him to be on hand Monday.

That the solicitor will make every effort to have the grand jurors reconsider their action in investigating Conley’s connection with the case is not denied by the solicitor himself and it is expected that the warmest fight that ever occurred in a grand jury room in Georgia will take place Monday when the question comes up.

It is said that several of the members are desirous of following the wishes of the solicitor and letting Conley’s case alone until the disposition of the indictment against Frank whom he accuses and the struggle between the two factions of the grand jury is expected to be a long and hot one before a decision is made.

The statement issued by the attorneys for Frank’s defense is in full as follows:

Statement of Attorneys.

Counsel for Leo M. Frank have refrained from making a statement for the papers except under strong provocation. Clearly counsel on both sides should refrain from any comment of or criticism on any action of the grand jury to be taken at its meeting next Monday, which might tend to hamper or limit the grand jury in their action upon the Conley case.

The grand jury is an independent body, it is under the control of no one.

A solicitor general is the advisor of that body as to legal principles merely but he has no right to exercise any sort of control in determining who shall or shall not be indicted.

To permit a solicitor general to use the position intrusted to him by he people to decide for himself who shall and shall not be indicted is a danger too great to be contemplated.

With this preliminary statement, we reluctantly make a reply to Solicitor Dorsey’s interview in this morning’s paper.

It is rather remarkable that the solicitor general and a person admitting complicity in a grave crime should get together in such harmonious concert of action as these two interviews show Mr. Dorsey admits that the indictment of Conley will have only a mild but undesirable effect on the state’s case against Leo M. Frank.

Ought the solicitor general for one moment to be influenced in his advice to the grand jury by any consideration of the effect upon anybody’s case?

It is not our understanding that the grand jury is organized to aid the solicitor general in his management of cases in court; their function is a higher one. They investigate every case of probable guilt and return an indictment. It could just as well be argued that the indictment of Frank might have had a mild but undesirable effect on Conley’s case in case Conley had been first indicted.

The position of the solicitor general in this case has from the beginning been most remarkable. It has been heretofore understood that the solicitor was to try cases sent to him by the grand jury, but in this case, detective-like, the solicitor is seeking to determine who shall be indicted. Forgetting his legal and constitutional functions, he is undertaking to control the action of the grand jury.

The citizens of this county elected Mr. Dorsey as solicitor general, but Mr. Dorsey has mistaken the purpose of his election. Evidently he believes that he was elected to be also the grand jury.

The solicitor general does his duty when he tries to the best of his ability cases sent to him by the grand jury. The solicitor falls far below the dignity of his office when he inflames public opinion thereby inducing a conviction, innocent or guilty.

The solicitor has closed his eyes to these plain truths and has rushed into print day by day proclaiming the guilt of Frank and the innocence of this negro apparently for no purpose but to convict Frank, innocent or guilty, for the gratification of his professional pride.

So far has the state’s counsel forgotten the function of a prosecuting which is only to ascertain the truth and convict the guilty that Mr. Dorsey’s detective assistant Chief Lanford in an interview in this morning’s paper, uses the following language as to the Pinkerton Detective Scott and Lanford’s refusal to allow him to sue Conley. We did not want to embarrass Scott by requesting him to keep silent and did not risk the probability of letting new developments reach Frank’s attorneys, therefore we were forced to prevent him from seeing the negro.

Why So Much Fear?

It seems, therefore, a matter for great endeavor on the part of the state as the solicitor and his associate detective sees it to keep whatever facts they rely upon to convict Frank from the defendant and his attorneys and the public.

If the facts in the solicitor’s possession were the truth, why so much fear as to letting them out? Is it possible that the effort is to ambush the defendant by the proof of circumstances on the trial which he has no opportunity to meet or explain? Is it possible that the state’s object is to keep the defendant in the dark as to the state’s evidence and to so conduct its case that he will have no opportunity to know the facts relied upon to convict him and no opportunity to clearly meet them and disprove them if they be false?

The solicitor has undertaken in this case to hold certain witnesses in custody. He undertook to do this in the case of the negro Conley, but so fearful was he that the negro might dare to tell all he knew that he went through the farce of requesting the superior court to no longer incarcerate Conley and to discharge him and immediately upon obtaining this order of discharge he went through the greater farce of having him loosed upon the streets and then immediately and illegally returning him to the city station house where he now is carefully watched, counselled, and interviewed by the solicitor, his assistant Mr. Hooper, and his detective assistants.

We have no criticism of the former grand jury, but some things happened before it as reported that tend at least to provoke serious inquiry.

When Leo M. Frank’s case was before the grand jury and in the midst of it Conley made his first confession, forced thereto by the discovery that he could write. It was suggested to the solicitor that this confession be brought to the grand jury’s attention. That would have been a fair thing to do. It was not done and rumor has it that Mr. Dorsey directed that it be not done.

One other thing is almost incredible according to the public prints when the solicitor wanted a vacation he was so afraid that the grand jury might act in his absence that he sought to extract a promise from these sworn servants of the state not to indict in his absence.

When before was it ever suggested to a grand jury that they must await the termination of a pleasure trip before they should indict in any case where indictment was necessary?

Little need be said in reply to lawyer W.M. Smith’s interview given in support of the solicitor’s petition.

Relies on Smith.

It is remarkable that the solicitor has to rely for support upon an argument made by Conley’s counsel. It is, however, appropriate that he should bolster up the solicitor as he depends mightily upon the solicitor to protect his negro Conley. Conley’s counsel realizes who is Conley’s friend and rushes in print to his rescue.

We are publishing this interview neither in an effort to have Conley indicted nor in an effort to have him not indicted. That is a matter solely for the grand jury. We are not making any appeal to them or to anybody else as to the effect Conley’s indictment would have on the Frank case. So far as we are concerned we feel that the failure of the solicitor general to secure an indictment against a confessed accessory to the crime of murder would make far more capital in favor of Frank upon his trial than if he were indicted. We think any jury, and we think any community would resent the rank favoritism shown this confessed criminal.

LUTHER Z. ROSSER,
LUTHER Z. ROSSER,

Statement by Conley’s Lawyer.

“This Phagan case certainly has its surprises,” said Attorney William M. Smith, Conley’s lawyer. “The grand jury breaking all known precedents, setting a new pace in Georgia criminal procedure, and now comes the remarkable proposition to disqualify five thousand good honest citizens of this county from service upon the jury in this case. It is said there are six thousand citizens of this county who are considered by our jury commissioners to the sufficiently ‘honest, and upright’ to serve upon our juries and pass upon the question of the guilt or innocence of Mr. Frank.

“Mr. Frank, in his defense, proposes, according to the papers, to have his jury selected from the grand jury list alone. It seems he is getting some sympathy from that direction at this time. There are only about 1,000 on the grand jury list. This seems to mean that the other 5,000 who do not happen to be in the grand jury list are, therefore, considered by Mr. Frank, in his decision, to be ‘undesirable jurors.’

“It is rumored that friends of Mr. Frank are busily circulating among our people, with a view to obtaining from each possible juror, an expression as to the personal opinion each man has as to the guilt or innocence of Mr. Frank. This would be much easier if the list was only 1,000 instead of 6,000 to work up. This is strange news, that in a county such as ours of more than 200,000 population, only 1,000, composed mainly of our wealthier class, are considered sufficiently ‘honest and upright,’ by this man, to try his case.

“Conley is not begging to be shielded. All he asks is a square deal, and he ought to have it. Let them both render account for their part in this brutal murder before juries selected regularly from the 6,000 honest jurors of this county and not from any ‘select’ juror class. It took twelve Virginia farmers to give a rich white man named Beattie justice in Virginia, and I doubt if any one of them was in the grand jury box of their county.

“As to indicting Conley at this time, I have looked over the list today, and I know too many honest men on the grand jury to believe that it will be done without some fight. Frank may have sufficient friends and influence to put it over, but we will wait and watch the line-up.”

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The Atlanta Constitution, July 20th 1913, “Frank’s Lawyers Score Dorsey for His Stand,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)