Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 160, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 July 1910 — Hank Granger Was Acquitted On the Fish Spear Charge. [ARTICLE]

Hank Granger Was Acquitted On the Fish Spear Charge.

The jury that tried Hank Granger, of Thayer, Wednesday, on the charge of unlawfully having a fish spear in his possession, returned a verdict of not guilty after hearing the evidence. December 2nd of last year, Deputy Game Wardens Lew Swartz and Rudolph Winchman saw a light on the marsh at night. They got a boat and rowed out to the light and found Granger and his son in a scow with two or three plckeral, four or five catfish and some carp. The game wardens testified that they found a fivepointed spear in the boat and that the fish showed evidence of having been speared. They failed to exhibit the spear.

Granger and his son testified that they had left their camp on Jerry's Island that night to string a trot line and that the fish in the scow Was the result of their night’s catch, that they had not owned a spear for eight years,

and that the “spear” seen by the wardens was simply a hook on a pole used for drawing up the trot line from the water. Granger and his soft testified that the night was dark and foggy and that they had/become lost in the marsh, and that they were wandering around bewildered when the game wardens discovered their light and rowed out to them. A number of witnesses for Granger testified that they saw the fish and that there was no evidence that a spear had been used. After the acquittal, two other cases, ' V- % one against Granger, and one against his son Fred, were dismissed.