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The Atlanta Georgian,
Tuesday, 21st April 1914,
4th Edition,
PAGE 1, COLUMN 8.
William J. Burns had "nothing to say" Tuesday concerning his prospective report on the Phagan murder case, but asserted that the result of his investigation in all probability would be made public some time Wednesday.
"I can't tell you the time of day, even," he said. "But I believe my report will be filed Wednesday."
This being the case, the report is expected to be made a part of the evidence cited in the retrial motion and used in the legal battle for another trial of Leo M. Frank, which opens Wednesday.
In the meantime Solicitor Dorsey has been occupied preparing his own side of the engagement. Witnesses, new and old, have been interviewed; conferences have been held with detectives from headquarters and detectives privately retained by Mr. Dorsey, and at least one important affidavit is said to have been made in the Solicitor's office by a young girl whose name was withheld.
It is said that the State has a big surprise ready to spring in the hearing Wednesday, and the report is that the Solicitor's office has come by some important new evidence that will aid materially in combating the motion for a new trial.
As to the reported purpose of the Grand Jury to press perjury charges against several Frank trial witnesses who have repudiated their testimony, nothing more definite has been learned. Mr. Dorsey would say nothing about the matter, not caring to put the prosecution in the position of influencing witnesses by fear of the Grand Jury's action. A. L. Waldo, the foreman, would say nothing further than that the Grand Jury had not taken any decided action.
LETTERS FROM READERS OF THE GEORGIAN
THE FRANK CASE.
Editor The Georgian:
When little Mary Phagan, a pure, sweet little girl met the awful death she did, almost a year now, I wanted to see Mr. Frank meet the most awful punishment that human mind could conceive of. It seemed that to hang him, just as an ordinary man who had taken life, would be far too good for such as he. I wanted him tortured to death, as he had in my mind then tortured little Mary. I myself was unable to think of punishment that would suit. I kept this opinion for months, though at times thoughts of his immortal soul would come to me, then I would remember that the little girl was dead; that in the cemetery at Marietta was a newmade grave; out somewhere in Atlanta there lived a brokenhearted mother.
Several weeks ago your paper published Mr. Frank's own account of the way he spent the day little Mary was killed. There seemed to me the truth running all through this article. He said his character had been proved and found clean. And I wondered if a man who had always been clean, one whom no trace of uncleanness or small crime had been found, would begin a life of crime with so heinous a crime. If he, unused to crime, could conceive of such an awful deed with which he stands charged? Does not crime start in a smaller way, and grow on one?
For a number of years I visited the jail and came in contact with crime of all kinds, and in this way became a pretty good judge of human faces. So I went to the jail to see Mr. Frank. After a long talk with him I came away, sure in my own mind of his innocence, for on his face I saw no trace of crime.
I am writing this to urge the people to go and see him and judge for themselves, and to add my voice to those already raised for a new and fair trial for Mr. Frank. The trial before was not fair or just. Could any men be at their right minds and ready to offer a fair and impartial sentence on anyone with the howling mob that surrounded the courthouse as on the day Mr. Frank was tried? Most certainly not.
This mob only cried for his blood, forgetting that they were taking human life, not being sure of the guilt. They only wanted the death of the child avenged, without waiting to be sure. And so this mob was willing to take the word of a self-confessed thief, jailbird and liar in the place of a man whose record was clean.
I make this plea for justice and justice alone. Let him have a fair trial is all any of his friends ask.
MRS. W. E. BELYEU.
No. 8 Williams street.
RAISING AN EARLY DUST.
Editor The Georgian:
Why is it that merchants permit their janitors to sweep out the stores in the morning about the time a great many people are going to work? Every morning on my way to work I have to pass through clouds of dust which is being stirred up by these sweepers. It gets into my eyes, nose and mouth, and I think I must be full of germs of all sorts by this time. It is very annoying, to say the least. Seems to me there should be some other way of disposing of the dust without driving it into the air of the streets.
WORKER.
CANAL TOLLS QUESTION.
Editor The Georgian:
I have read all your editorials and comment concerning the Panama Canal tolls question and I must say I think you are eminently correct in the position you take regarding it. The United States owns the canal and should not have to ask anyone how it is to be managed. True, the canal will be of world-wide benefit, but if this country isn't to profit most by its own undertaking, then the whole scheme, it seems to me, is wrong.
READER.
STANDING IN STREET CARS.
Editor The Georgian:
When I return from the city on a car around the hours the working man does, it is because I have had all my housework to do that morning, take care of my baby, and then, if I get my shopping done, it must be done after dinner is over and the dishes cleared away.
I feel there are thousands of such ladies, and they are doing their part and are as tired as the gentlemen. For my part, I can stand and let the gentlemen rest.
LADY READER.
FRANK LAWYERS SCORE POLICE AS MENACE
Declare Detention, or Retirement, of Negro Mc Knight at Station Is Outrage.
To the Editor of The Georgian:
So many things foreign to fair play have happened heretofore in the Frank case that nothing now seems to matter. Anything, no matter how outrageous, seems to pass muster. Police officers brazenly do things that, in ordinary cases, would provoke an outburst of indignation.
This is well illustrated in the case of the negro Albert Mc Knight. Albert came into notoriety, during the jury trial of Frank, by swearing to the most potent falsehoods.
After the trial, he recanted, as he now claims, by influences improperly exerted upon him.
Then, under some potent influence, he cantered back again to his old role as perjurer.
Not Rare For His Kind.
These various performances of Albert are not rare enough in creatures of his character to excite comment or to suggest danger.
There are among whites and blacks a tribe of shiftless, shifting witnesses, who are easily, by persuasion or fear, led into perjury and who, when the pressure is lifted, slide back to the truth.
Albert evidently belongs to that tribe. When under potent influence and pressure, he can easily be led into silly falsehood. When uninfluenced, and at liberty, like almost everybody else, whether wise or ignorant, he naturally slips back to the truth.
As a matter of fact, it differs very little whether Albert swore to the truth on Frank's trial and a lie thereafter, or whether he lied at the trial and told the truth thereafter.
"Police Attitude Dangerous."
But the attitude of the police, as shown in the Albert Mc Knight incident, matters a great deal. They are not content as in decency and public safety they ought to be in getting, freely and voluntarily, the truth from Albert; but when they get what they want truth or no truth they see that Albert goes into the comfortable retirement of a cell at the police station to be, as we are informed, cared for and fed at the public expense.
This, upon the surface, may seem a small affair, but a moment's consideration will show how dangerous it is. If ignorant witnesses, as soon as they make statements pleasing to the State or retract statements unpleasing, are to be voluntarily or involuntarily locked up in the station house and held day and night under partisan police protection, aloof and apart from everybody but the prosecution, even the best and most peaceful citizen may, at any moment, be placed in great danger.
And if, in such situation, there is danger even to the popular and strong, what about the danger to the weak, the stranger, or the man or woman temporarily suffering from unjust prejudice and suspicion? No just, fair-minded citizen can contemplate this situation without the greatest apprehension!
If the prosecution can find it wise to give Albert Mc Knight an asylum in the station house, and the courts and public opinion permit it, what is to prevent every witness against Frank and, indeed, every witness that can be bulldozed away from Frank, from occupying the cells of the police barracks, entertained at the expense and at all times under the sway and spell of partisan police methods and safe from other influences, no matter how wise, fair or just?
Conley Called Police Pet.
Conley was the first police pet police-trained witness. There had been none before. This Conley departure, during the excitement of the Frank trial, was apparently indorsed by the courts and the public.
This Conley experience was so successful it trained and preserved Conley so skillfully, that the prosecution could not resist repeating it in the case of Albert Mc Knight. And if it passes muster in the Albert Mc Knight case, we may expect it to become a regular, fixed institution; hereafter the public will at once, through the police, take charge of and incarcerate all the witnesses in the case, both for the defense and the prosecution; those for the State so that their stories told to the police may suffer no change, no matter what the truth may be; those for the defense so that the power and force of the police may lead them, if not into silence, at least into a moderation of statement.
The State's power is potential enough when witnesses are left free and untrammeled with no influence but their consciences to guide them. It becomes a mighty engine of oppression and tyranny, when false witnesses are held firmly by cells and police surveillance.
Let it come, as it seems it may, that men and women are hereafter to be tried by police-nursed, jail-fed witnesses, and no man or woman in Fulton County will be safe.
Frank Victim of Police.
Frank suffers from such methods today. Tomorrow the sufferance may be the wisest and best! Put the witness in the hands of the police and, at once, the courts and juries come under their subjection and control. The police witness has not always been of the best repute but better for the police witness himself, than the police-held, police-trained and police-fed witness!
No matter what may be the fate of Frank, the incarceration of Minola Mc Knight, the caressing and petting of Conley by police and prosecution, the harboring and supporting of Albert and the threats and intimations against other witnesses will, in the sane, calm years to come, be a foul stench in the nostrils of the people of Fulton County, as it is today in cities not suffering from the excitement and hysteria of the Frank trial.
L. Z. ROSSER.
R. R. ARNOLD.
FRANK INNOCENT SAYS BURNS; TO REPORT SOON
"My Evidence Will Convince Dorsey," Declares Detective in First Positive Statement.
For the first time since he began his investigation of the murder of Mary Phagan, Detective William J. Burns Tuesday made a positive statement asserting the innocence of Leo Frank. He declared that his report, covering every detail of the investigation which his agency has made, has been completed and will be turned over to Frank's attorneys whenever they are ready for it, probably within a few hours.
"My report will prove beyond the shadow of a doubt who murdered the little girl," said Mr. Burns. "It will convince Solicitor Hugh Dorsey and the police department of Leo Frank's innocence."
"It also will prove that the charges of perversion made against him are false, and that his character is as good as that of any man in Atlanta."
Report Still Secret.
"Frank did not kill Mary Phagan and my report will contain evidence proving it."
Mr. Burns refused to divulge the contents of his report, nor would he say whether the murderer is a white man or a negro.
"My report will show that," he said. "It probably will be made public within a day or two. I completed it this morning and am ready to turn it over to Frank's attorneys. It will be given to the public by them."
Attorneys for Frank refused to say when the report would be made public, and would not state whether it will be released before or after the hearing of the motion for a new trial before Judge Ben Hill Wednesday.
Clears Mysterious Features.
Mr. Burns Tuesday reiterated his statements that the murder was committed by a pervert.
"The crime is typical of the pervert," he said, "and I have proof in my report that such a person committed the crime."
"The report also will clear up the mystery of the disappearance of the ribbons and flowers which Mary Phagan wore upon her hat, and will clear up other features that heretofore have been puzzling."