Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 28


Here we see Mary Phagan’s mother and sisters, looking somber sometime after their beloved Mary was killed.

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

THE TITLE of this section of the book — “Who’s Who in the Leo Frank Case” — might sound like it’s describing a dry, lifeless list of names. But it is not. This is a most valuable and interesting piece for every serious student of the Leo Frank case. It puts all the players into perspective, with brief but significant details about the role of each. It makes an excellent refresher as we near the end of the book. Most striking to me was the fact that, early on in the case, so many Jews — even Jews close to Leo Frank — considered him guilty of the murder of Mary Phagan.

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Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 27

Jonathan Greenblatt, head of the Jewish ADL: His group has pushed the highly problematic “Leo Frank is innocent” narrative for a century.

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

AS WE NEAR the end of this monumental audio book, we hear the long and moving list of lynching victims, contemporaries of Leo Frank — dozens upon dozens of names, and even some poor souls without names, so unsung were they and so uninvestigated were their murders. After hearing and comprehending the magnitude of these extrajudicial killings, it will become impossible for you to believe in the mainstream media’s — and the ADL’s — emphasis on Leo Frank as the main or only lynching victim worth knowing about, or their promotion of the “Leo Frank was persecuted” narrative, ever again.

We also hear the perspicacious and intelligent take on the case from the Nation of Islam’s Historical Research Group, who authored this, the most important book on the Frank case in over 100 years. They write from the perspective of the black diaspora in America (a point of view almost never heard from on this subject in the mass media). But there are lessons for all peoples here. One might not always agree with every idea expressed by the authors, but this reader sees The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man as one of the most astonishingly honest and meticulously researched modern history books he has read. Anyone who thought that the Nation of Islam was a bunch of “ignorant haters” has just been proven spectacularly wrong.

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Protest of Solicitor Dorsey Wins

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

The Atlanta Georgian

Monday, July 21, 1913

Presents Evidence Showing Indictment of Negro Would Hinder Frank Prosecution.

Here are the important developments of Monday in the Phagan case:

The decision of the Grand Jury of Fulton County not to bring at this time an indictment against James Conley.

The information that there is a strong probability of another postponement of the trial of Leo M. Frank.

The Grand Jury’s refusal to reopen its investigation of the Phagan murder mystery was a decided victory for the Solicitor after that body had overridden his request that no session be called to take up the matter in any of its aspects.

A report that Judge L.S. Roan, who will preside at the Frank trial, had signified his desire that the case be put off until fall, gave rise to the expectation that another postponement will take place, and that the date probably will be set for some week in September.

Defense Said To Be Willing.

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Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 26

Leo M. Frank

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

THE LEO Frank case marked the maturation of — and radical changes in — the organized Jewish strategies relating to both whites and blacks in the United States. Prior to the Frank case, Jewish groups had definitely positioned themselves (whatever they privately thought, which may have been quite different) as a white ethnicity, and in the South they fully supported segregation, Jim Crow laws, and the social and legal supremacy of whites. After the Leo Frank case, however, organized Jewish interests increasingly portrayed themselves as a “persecuted minority,” suffering under widespread “anti-Semitism,” and co-victims, along with Black people, of white supremacism. But there is a great deal of evidence, some in the Frank case itself, to show that this change was strictly self-serving and insincere. For one example, we should ask ourselves: How did it serve the interests of the multitude of Black lynching victims and their loved ones for the major media outlets operated by Jews to give thousands of times more publicity to the single Jewish victim of lynching — Leo Frank — than to the hundreds upon hundreds of black people who were killed in the same way?

 

In this, the twenty-sixth audio segment of this ground-breaking work originally published by the Nation of Islam, part of their series called The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, we also learn of the brazen way in which Leo Frank himself, and the masters of mass persuasion who worked for him, literally made this sleazy convicted sex killer, abuser and murderer of a 13-year-old girl, into a messiah-like “martyr” and repeatedly compared him to Jesus.

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Dorsey Is Seeking to Be Grand Jury And Solicitor Too, Say Frank’s Counsel

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

The Atlanta Journal

Sunday, July 20, 1913

SOLICITOR SCORED FOR HIS ATTITUDE IN CONLEY’S CASE

Rosser and Arnold Charge Dorsey Seeks to Convict Frank, Guilty or Innocent, Out of Professional Pride

“SHUTTING EYES TO TRUTH, DORSEY PROTECTS NEGRO”

Attorneys Intimate That Dorsey Fears to Let Truth Be Known – Attitude Throughout Case Is Criticised

The attitude of Solicitor General Hugh M. Dorsey throughout the Phagan investigation, and especially in his attempt to block a grand jury indictment of Jim Conley, is scored in an interview made public by Luther Z. Rosser and Reuben R. Arnold, counsel for Leo M. Frank.

“The solicitor is seeking to convict Frank innocent or guilty, in order to gratify his professional pride,” Frank’s attorneys say.

In the course of the intetrview [sic] the two famous attorneys, who have been engaged to defend the man accused of the murder of Mary Phagan, charge that the solicitor is protecting the negro Conley.

Mr. Dorsey is severely criticised not only for his avowed intention of trying to block the indictment of Conley by the grand jury Monday, but because he prevented the last grand jury, the one, which indicted Frank, from acting on Conley’s case, and because he did not place before the last grand jury any of Conley[‘s] confessions.

Solicitor Dorsey is geeting [sic] his legal and constitutional functions in seeking to control the action of the grand judy [sic],” Attorneys Rosser and Arnold declare.

Despite the criticism of his attitude, there is little doubt that Solicitor Dorsey will be present Monday, when the grand jury takes up the consideration of the Conley case. In fact the solicitor’s presence has been requested by W.D. Beattie, the foreman of the grand jury, who called the meeting.

Solicitor Dorsey is still confident that the grand jury will not indict Conley.

There is little doubt that there will be a quorum present, when the grand jury meeting is called Monday, for Deputy Sheriff Plennie Minor has found that  19 of the 20 grand jurors empanneled [sic] are in the city, and they have promised to be present Monday. It takes 18 grand jurors to act on a bill of indictment. The statement of Mr. Rosser and Mr. Arnold, scoring the solicitor is as follows:

STATEMENT IN FULL.

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Dorsey Fights Movement to Indict Conley

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

The Atlanta Georgian

Sunday, July 20, 1913

Solicitor Is Bombarded With Letters to Proceed Against Negro as Slayer of Mary Phagan.

THE GRAND JURY IS CALLED

Hottest Battle of Famous Case To Be Waged Behind Closed Doors of Inquisitory Body.

Solicitor Dorsey is fighting vigorously the movement in the Grand Jury to indict Jim Conley Monday for the murder of Mary Phagan, despite the bambardment [sic] of letters from many citizens and by the sentiment of some of its own members.

It is for the consideration of these letters and petitions, asking the reopening of the Phagan matter, that the meeting has been called.

It was in the face of Solicitor Dorsey’s bitterest opposition that the meeting was called at all. Foreman Beattie issued his defi [sic] after a previous Grand Jury had been defeated in its efforts to reopen the case with a view of indicting Jim Conley and after Dorsey explicitly had expressed his strongest disapproval of such a move.

Crucial Battle Coming.

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Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 25

The cartoonish illustration for the Nashville Tennessean’s publication of Alonzo Mann’s “revelations” was an apt harbinger of the bad journalism to follow.

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

THE PROPAGANDA DISGUISED as journalism put forth by the partisans of Leo Frank has been ongoing for more than a century now. But for pure bluster, shallowness, self-promotion, and incompetence, there is none as egregious as the Nashville Tennessean’s money-fueled subsidy and promotion of the Alonzo Mann hoax in 1982.

 

In this, the twenty-fifth audio segment of this ground-breaking work originally published by the Nation of Islam, part of their series called The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, we take the falsehoods the Tennessean invented — or regurgitated, some of them debunked as long ago as 1913 — in their promotion of Alonzo Mann’s contradictory tale and show them for what they are: a sad attempt to exploit a sick, old man — and rehabilitate the reputation of a sex killer (who just happened to be a B’nai B’rith official and member of a wealthy elite).

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Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 24

Alonzo Mann in 1982, left, and 1913

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

THERE HAS NEVER been a better refutation of the 1982 supposed testimony of Alonzo Mann “exonerating” Leo Frank of the charge of murder than in this book by the Historical Research Department of the Nation of Islam. They bring up the points that writers for the Mercury have brought up casting considerable doubt on Mann’s story, but add new information that, to this writer’s knowledge, has never been published before. It is the definitive deconstruction of the Mann fable, which was used in the 1980s as a bludgeon by the ADL — twice — to try and extract a pardon for Frank from the state of Georgia — something that might well be tried again now that a new governor is in place there.

 

In this, the twenty-fourth audio segment of this ground-breaking work originally published by the Nation of Islam, part of their series called The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, we will also learn of the bizarre claim of a pro-Frank partisan that “bite marks” were found on the body of Mary Phagan and that the marks “did not match Leo Frank’s teeth.” No such marks were ever found; the widely circulated tale is a complete fabrication.

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Attorney for Conley Makes a Statement

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

The Atlanta Georgian

Sunday, July 20, 1913

“Not Necessary to Indict Negro to Close His Mouth,” Declares William Smith.

William M. Smith, attorney for Jim Conley, the negro now being held as a material witness in the Phagan murder case and whose indictment for complicity in the crime will be considered by the Grand Jury Monday, brought to the office of The Sunday American Saturday night a statement in behalf of his client.

In a letter accompanying the statement, Mr. Smith conveyed a doubt as to whether this newspaper would print what he had to say.

The attorney’s statement in full follows:

The Grand Jury list published showed the names of some men whom I know, and know they are on the square, and, if they once understand the real situation, there will be a bear fight before Jim Conley is indicted at this time.

Of course it would be great work, if the State could be forced to so indict Conley as to make his testimony legally inadmissible against Frank. What a beautiful technical advantage for the Grand Jury to work to close Conley’s mouth against Frank.

Code of Georgia, section 1035: “Confessions of conspirators. The confession of one joint offender or conspirator, made after the enterprise is ended, is admissible only against himself.”

How long would the good people of this county stand for such legal jugglery to save a brutal murderer from the gallows? It is right that both men shall talk. The Grand Jury can name Conley as a joint offender or conspirator, they can give him a “legal status,” which we have heard so much howl about for the last few days, and save Frank from the embarrassment of having to face Conley, even when he is tried. The Grand Jury may know more about what is legally proper to do in this matter than the men who have been playing this game for a living for years, but they had better move slow. We have been studying the principles underlying this fight for months, and they are fresh hands, just on the job for a few days.

It is not necessary to indict Conley to close his mouth. I can close it and help Frank to go free, and then Mr. Mincey and others of his type can be run off by the friends of Mr. Frank, and be inaccessible as witnesses when Conley is tried, and then Conley can go free. This could be done, but it won’t be. Unless they get me fired from my representation of Conley, and unless the Grand Jury fixes his “legal status” so he can’t swear, Conley will answer the roll call as a witness and tell the whole truth as he knows it. It is evident that a trade whereby Conley would close his mouth would be advantageous to both. With Mr. Mincey and others non est inventus, as I imagine they will be if they are not held after swearing, by some process, Conley could not possibly be convicted of murdering the girl himself, and with Frank free Conley could not even be indicted and punished as an accessory after the fact. Such a trade might even be made interesting to Conley’s lawyer, from a financial viewpoint. In fact, everybody but society and the administration of justice would be helped.

We are not looking for trades. Let everybody tell the whole truth, as they see it, and then let justice take its full course, unhampered by ringers or other influences, permeating either the grand or petit juries of this county. When this is done, the fiendish murder of Mary Phagan will be avenged and the civic conscience of our good people satisfied.

WILLIAM M. SMITH.

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The Atlanta Georgian, July 20th 1913, “Attorney for Conley Makes a Statement,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)

Mincey Ready to Tell Story to Grand Jury

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

The Atlanta Georgian

Sunday, July 20, 1913

Man Who Says He Heard Negro Confess Now Is at Rising Fawn, Ga.

W.H. Mincey, the school teacher who made an affidavit declaring Jim Conley confessed to him on the afternoon of the murder of Mary Phagan that he killed a girl, will appear before the Grand Jury to repeat his startling story when that tribunal convenes Monday to consider the Phagan matter, it was reported Saturday night.

Mincey, who is now at Rising Fawn, Ga., has expressed his willingness to come to Atlanta for this purpose. His evidence, which has proved the most important of all that has come to light since Conley’s affidavit directing guilt at Frank, is considered of the greatest weight in bringing the Grand Jury to its consideration of indicting Conley.

Hugh Dorsey, Solicitor General, insisted Saturday that his every effort would be directed against the indictment of Conley.

The Solicitor will not fight in Conley’s defense except as a last resort. His chief desire is that the Grand Jury postpone action in regard to the negro until after the Frank trial.

“Conley can be indicted after the Frank trial is disposed of much more properly than at present,” said the Solicitor Saturday. “And by the delay, there will be no danger of a miscarriage of justice.”

The chief contention of the Solicitor is that with Conley indicted for the murder, and with uncertainty thus engendered, much of the force of the State’s case against Leo M. Frank will be lost. It is the insistent declaration by police, city detectives and the Solicitor’s force that a chain of direct and apparently conclusive evidence has been forged against Frank.

It is mostly for this reason that Dorsey will request the Grand Jury to keep its hands off the Conley case. The Solicitor also hinted that he holds evidence, revelation of which would prevent the Grand Jury from indicting the negro. He feels also, as he announced, that a consideration of the Phagan case at this time will bring about an indiscreet exploitation of the State’s evidence, thus revealing essential features of the prosecution’s case to the defense.

All this he will present to the Grand Jury, it is expected.

Other phases of the case discussed Saturday included the intimation that the Frank defense will ask for a trial jury drawn from the Grand Jury box, and not from the petit jury box. The legality of this procedure, according to the Solicitor, is a matter of conjecture.

The Grand Jury will meet Monday at 10 o’clock, at the call of the foreman. The body has only twenty members, and by statute a quorum of eighteen is necessary to consider the indictment or exoneration of a person. The fact that a small margin thus is left for probable absence seems to strengthen the Solicitor’s forecast that no indictment will be returned against Conley at this time.

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The Atlanta Georgian, July 20th 1913, “Mincey Ready to Tell Story to Grand Jury,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)

Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 23

William Smith, “volunteer” attorney for James Conley, who later alleged he had had a change of heart and believed Conley to be guilty.

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

ATTORNEY WILLIAM SMITH traded his “free” services as a lawyer for James Conley for the influence of an agent of the William Burns detective agency, Dan Lehon, in an unrelated abduction case — illustrating either extreme naïveté or weak legal ethics on Smith’s part. Smith’s defection from advocate for Conley to accusing him of murder is a very strange about-face. But sudden about-faces abound in the Leo Frank case, especially involving people 1) who had strong evidence against Leo Frank, and 2) who subsequently had close contact with agents of the William Burns agency, who were working for Frank.

In this, the twenty-third audio segment of this ground-breaking work originally published by the Nation of Islam, part of their series called The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, we will also learn of the shameless abuse of the family and legacy of Judge Leonard Roan, who two years earlier had presided over Frank’s trial. Judge Roan was visited on his deathbed by Leo Frank’s attorneys, who, shortly after the judge’s death, produced an alleged letter from him saying he believed Frank innocent and deserved a new trial — precisely what Frank’s attorneys were trying to achieve at the time. Both internal evidence in the letter itself — and statements from Judge Roan’s own family — indicate that the letter is a forgery.

 

This new audio book, based on the Nation of Islam’s The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, the best investigative effort made on the Leo Frank case in the last 100 years, will take you on a trip into the past — to the greatest American murder mystery of all time; a mystery that will reveal to you the hidden forces that shape our world even today. Continue Reading →

Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 22

There is no doubt that Mary Phagan’s body was dragged from the elevator to where it was found in front of the furnace.

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

ONE OF the weirdest aspects of the Leo Frank case was the — shall we say — strained effort of the Frank team to make some human excrement found in the National Pencil Company elevator shaft into a “proof” that Leo Frank was innocent of murdering Mary Phagan. This so-called “shit in the shaft” theory was based on the overwhelming fear of the Frank defense that the use of that elevator to move Mary’s body — evidenced by dragging marks in the basement’s dirt floor leading from the elevator to precisely where the body was found — was too damning for their client, since only Frank had a key to the elevator. The theory they crafted was that the excrement was deposited at the bottom of the shaft before the murder by James Conley, but was “crushed for the first time” when the detectives visited the basement after the murder — therefore, they claimed, the elevator could not have been used to move Mary’s body.

 

The “shit in the shaft” tale was used by Governor John Slaton as one of his reasons for commuting Frank’s sentence in 1915.

In this, the twenty-second audio segment of this ground-breaking work originally published by the Nation of Islam, part of their series called The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, we will see how Continue Reading →

Mincey Story Declared Vital To Both Sides in Frank Case

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

The Atlanta Georgian

Sunday, July 20, 1913

By AN OLD POLICE REPORTER.

The most important and interesting development of the week in the Phagan case was the Mincey affidavit, directing suspicion more surely in the direction of James Conley than ever before, if the affidavit is that of a credible witness.

If what Mincey says is true—if his evidence can be made to “stand up” in court—then he is far and away not only the most important witness yet discovered, but his testimony will serve to clear up the mysterious Phagan case in its most obscure phases.

Solicitor General Hugh Dorsey has attacked Mincey’s credibility. Naturally, he would do that.

If Mincey is worthy of belief and is speaking the truth, he has dealt the State’s case against Frank a deadly blow, from which it can not hope to recover.

If he does not speak the truth, and that can be established, it will redound fo [sic] the hurt of the defense, for it will have a bracing-up effect upon Conley’s other story.

But Who Is Mincey?

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Counsel of Frank Says Dorsey Has Sought to Hide Facts

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

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.

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Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 21

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

THE “death notes” left beside Mary Phagan’s body when she was murdered in 1913 have been the subject of endless speculation. Were the notes written by James Conley at the direction of Mary’s convicted killer, Leo Frank? — or were they Conley’s creation alone? — or were they purpose-written by Frank, using Conley’s writing as a guide, in order to throw suspicion away from the real killer and onto a Black man?

 

In this, the twenty-first audio segment of this ground-breaking work originally published by the Nation of Islam, part of their series called The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, we will learn what handwriting experts say about the notes, and we will also learn how the historical record has been distorted by Leo Frank partisans such as author Steve Oney.

This new audio book, based on the Nation of Islam’s The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, the best investigative effort made on the Leo Frank case in the last 100 years, will take you on a trip into the past — to the greatest American murder mystery of all time; a mystery that will reveal to you the hidden forces that shape our world even today.

To read all the chapters we’ve published so far, simply click on this link.

We at The American Mercury are now proud to present part 21 of our audio version of this very important book, read by Vanessa Neubauer.

Simply press “play” on the player embedded above — or at the end of this article — to hear part 21 of the book.

* * *

Click here to obtain a print or e-book copy of this important work, The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, Vol. 3; The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man.

For further information on the Nation of Islam Historical Research Group, readers are encouraged to visit their Web site, noirg.org.

 

Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 20

The death notes found near Mary Phagan’s body – click for high resolution

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

ONE OF the most mysterious aspects of the Leo Frank case is the series of “death notes,” four of which were written, according to testimony, but only two of which were ever found. They were discovered right next to the dead body of Frank’s victim, 13-year-old Mary Phagan. If taken at face value, they appear as though they were written by Mary while she was being assaulted. But they also are written in an approximation of the African-American vernacular of that time and in a semi-literate style that Mary Phagan would have been extremely unlikely to use. Were they written by a Black killer, in a hopelessly botched attempt to throw investigators off the trail? Or were they created by a clever killer to make us think that the murderer was a Black man? Were they perhaps even dictated by the killer to a compliant Black man to write, who would thereby impose his genuine style — and handwriting — on them? (ILLUSTRATION: Two of the four murder notes — the other two were never found.)

In this, the twentieth audio segment of this ground-breaking work originally published by the Nation of Islam, part of their series called The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, we also learn that the latter scenario — with Leo Frank dictating the notes to James Conley — is exactly what Conley said actually happened. Much has been made by Frank partisans of the fact that Conley’s language on the stand more or less matched the style and usage of the notes, claiming that this rules out Frank having dictated them. But that claim has little merit, for it seems very unlikely that Frank would want to dictate the notes word for word: Allowing Conley to put them in his own words and style would have served Frank’s purpose much better. We’ll also learn of the glaring weaknesses of Frank’s other alibis, many of which appear to have been hastily and sloppily cobbled together at the last minute.

 

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Grim Justice Pursues Mary Phagan’s Slayer

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

The Atlanta Constitution

Sunday, July 20, 1913

As Famous Murder Case Nears Trial the Public Mind Again Reverts to the Discovery of the Crime; and Again the Great Question Comes Up:

“What Happened in the Pencil Factory Between Noon Saturday and 3:15 Sunday Morning?”

By Britt Craig.

Automobile in which detectives and newspaper men went to the scene of the murder. In the machine are Detective Starnes, Harry Scott, W. W. (Boots) Rogers and John Black.

There are things that happen right before our eyes that defy the pen of a god to describe. The mind of a master would find itself lamentably incompetent, and the words of a Demosthenes would become panic-stricken in the attempt.

One of these was the night Mary Phagan’s body was found. It was a night as dramatic as the fury of a queen and poignant as her sorrow. It wrote the first thrilling chapter of Atlanta’s greatest criminal case, and it will live forever in the minds of those who knew it.

This story is no effort at description, because description is impossible. It is just a plain, ordinary story of the happenings that night when Newt Lee went down into the basement to wash his hands and emerged, overcome with fear, the discoverer of a crime that put an entire state in mourning.

A week from tomorrow, Leo Frank, manager of the pencil factory, where Mary Phagan’s body was found, will be placed on trial charged with the murder of the young girl, and interest in this mysterious crime again goes back to the night when Newt Lee startled police headquarters with news of his grewsome find.

Finding the Body.

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Audio Book – The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, part 19

James Conley

by Philip St. Raymond
for The American Mercury

THE TESTIMONY of Black men and women was pivotal in the trial of Leo M. Frank for the murder of Mary Phagan, and was so regarded by both the prosecution and defense. But little-heralded then, or now, is the horribly bad treatment these Black witnesses repeatedly received. The prosecution often “sweated” or gave Black witnesses “the Third Degree” — which meant physically or verbally threatening or abusing them, with the idea being that only under such severe fear would Black people tell the truth. Even the man on trial, the man the prosecution said was guilty of murder, Leo M. Frank, never received treatment even remotely like this from the police, the detectives, or the prosecutor’s office. Leo Frank partisans, for their part, strove mightily to frame two Black men, Newt Lee and Jim Conley, with planted “evidence” and hired perjury, and at one point even solicited the murder of James Conley, the Black man whose testimony against Frank was among the most important in the case.

 

In this, the nineteenth audio segment of this ground-breaking work originally published by the Nation of Islam, part of their series called The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, we also learn of the highly improbable claims of the Frank defense, including Leo Frank’s bizarre claim on the stand that he had “unconsciously” used the toilet at the very location and time at which Mary Phagan was being strangled to death — incidentally leaving his valuable papers and payroll unguarded in an unlocked, open office in an unlocked building.

This new audio book, based on the Nation of Islam’s The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man, the best investigative effort made on the Leo Frank case in the last 100 years, will take you on a trip into the past — to the greatest American murder mystery of all time; a mystery that will reveal to you the hidden forces that shape our world even today.

To read all the chapters we’ve published so far, simply click on this link.

We at The American Mercury are now proud to present part 19 of our audio version of this very important book, read by Vanessa Neubauer.

Simply press “play” on the player embedded above — or at the end of this article — to hear part 19 of the book.

* * *

Click here to obtain a print or e-book copy of this important work, The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews, Vol. 3; The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man.

For further information on the Nation of Islam Historical Research Group, readers are encouraged to visit their Web site, noirg.org.

 

Mrs. Nina Formby Will Not Return for Trial

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

The Atlanta Constitution

Sunday, July 20, 1913

Woman Swore That Leo M. Frank Tried to Engage Room on Night of Murder

Mrs. Nina Formby, who signed an affidavit in the Frank case in which she swore the superintendent has endeavored to engage a room at her house, 400 Piedmont avenue, during the Phagan murder night to which he might bring a girl has fled to Chattanooga and will not appear at the coming trial on July 28. This announcement was made to a Constitution reporter last night by the woman’s legal representative, John Gossett. Gossett states that she is fearful of facing cross examination on some phases of her story.

A letter has been placed on file in Gossett’s office in which the Formby woman asks for a continuance of a trial in which she will be arraigned before a justice court. August or September are the months to which she asks the case be put. The letter says that she will not be in Atlanta until that time. She has obtained a position in the Tennessee city, she says, and intends making Chattanooga her future home.

At first it was intimated that the state would put credence in the affidavit, but on account of the woman’s character it was later considered of but little value.

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The Atlanta Constitution, July 20th 1913, “Mrs. Nina Formby Will Not Return for Trial,” Leo Frank case newspaper article series (Original PDF)

Frank’s Lawyers Score Dorsey for His Stand

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.

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