Jasper County Democrat, Volume 13, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 September 1910 — WRITTEN EVIDENCE. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

WRITTEN EVIDENCE.

It Is Better Than Any Other. By EDITH V. ROSS. [Copyright, 1910, by American Press Asso* . ciation.J “No one with a human soul in his body would take advantage of the law to force a woman, to marry him.” “I consider it my duty to prevent her from marrying such a contemptible cur as you are.” “Were you my equal in any respect I would make you pay for those words even if I had to take your life.” “Why not do It anyway? You’re capable of it. Then you could get the fortune intended for me.” This brief dialogue was made the basis of an ingenious theory concocted by a state attorney, which led logically to fixing the murder of Roger Cruikshank upon Adrian Dresser. The words were overheard a few days before Cruikshank was found shot

through the heart in his own house. For defense the prisoner’s attorney had elaborate diagrams made to demonstrate that Cruikshank died by his own hand. There is a point made mnch of In such cases—the motive for the crime. It is certainly an important matter for consideration, but has too often been mistaken for proof. It does not follow that because a man has had a motive for murder he has committed murder. But an ingenious prosecutor, taking such motive for a basis, may weave in with it certain other circumstantial evidence and with the two convict an innocent man. Adrian Dresser and Florence Pitman had been brought up together. That is, they had from birth lived in the same neighborhood, had been playmates and eventually lovers. Any one looking at Florence would say, “That girl would love her lover with her whole heart and soul.” There was something in the wonderfully expressive eyes, the contour of the face, that indicated this. And any one knowing her would arrive at the same conclusion as that reached merely by seeing her.

There are people of an entirely different makeup from this, people who cannot understan^F’’any snch spiritual depth. Such was Cornelius Pitman, Florence’s uncle. He had been a money getter all his life and when he came to die, having no children, left his fortune to Florence. But his passion for accumulation lived, so to speak, beyond his natural life. He saw in a relative, Boger Cruikshank, one capable by shrewdness, foresight and meanness of increasing the estate intended for a young girl whose heart would rather lead her to scatter than add to it He therefore left a provision in the will to insure Cruikshank’s management of the property. Florence was to marry him. By the terms of the will Cruikshank had only to refuse to marry the legatee to enable her to inherit without him included. This he refused to do, and his action called forth the scathing words with which this story begins. If they had not been spoken Creikshank's sudden death would have solved the problem for the lovers, and they might have been united, the bride inheriting the fortune bequeathed to her. As it was. Dresser was put on trial for his life, and that life depended upon which had the greater ingenuity. the man who built upon the theory that the accused was guilty or the man who by his diagrams was trying to prove that the dead man shot himself Tin* result in this case was that • ’henry of the prosecutor wah est-i’. " Ito the satisfaction of the jury. : he showed conclusively by his ipt !ont's diagrams that a shot fired .eiordSnce therewith would miss fnark by two and one-half inches. . ; As accessory to his theory counsel for the defense proved that there was insanity in the family of the deceased and that his grandfather had shot himself. He further proved that the day of the death or the suicide had beam

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SHOWED HIM THE NEW BIT OF EVIDENCE.