Jasper County Democrat, Volume 18, Number 91, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 February 1916 — ON TRIAL [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

ON TRIAL

Novelized by Charles N. Lurie From the Great Play by Elmer Reizenstein

SYNOPSIS Robert Strickland is on trial for kffllns Gerald Trask In the latter’s library at tdght. District Attorney Gray declares Strickland killed Trask, with the aid of an accomplice, who escaped, for the sake of SIO,OOO in cash, which Strickland had test repaid to Trask. The defendant and Trask were the only two who knew the combination to the safe. Important, figares in the case are Arbuckle, counsel for the defense, and Glover, who was Trask's secretary. Strickland would not make defense, but law compels him to do so. Mrs. Strickland disappeared after the shooting. Mrs. Trask, on stand, tells of telephone can made on her husband, on the night of his death, by a woman who would not give her name. Trask promised to reform, and his wife forgave him, although It was only fear of a divorce suit that prompted him. Later when the two bad gone to their respective rooms the telephone bell rang again, Trask answering to acme one he called •'May," who is unknown to his wife. Strickland entered the library, shot Trask and was struck down by Glover. The money was stolen. Glover la called to testify. Glover tells of striking down Strickland and taking from his pocket a card bearing the combination of the safe. Strickland tried to tear the card, be said, and succeeded in tearing It almost in half. Little Doris Strickland is called to the stand agnlnst her father's agonized protest" Mr. and Krs. Trask Quarreled about his attentions to other women, and she draggad out of the past “that affair at Great Neck," thirteen years before, In which a Miss Deane was Involved. Trask returned from Long Branch that night and told of giving by mistake the combination of the safe to Strickland. Mrs. Trask asked him la vain for name of woman who called him up. Glover and Trask discussed Strickland and praised him. Doris Strickland tells of her father’s happy homecoming from Cleveland on the fatal night. Before bts return, she testlOaa, her mother telephoned to the Jersey railroad about a lost purse. Mother was downtown shopping the day before, she tells daddy. Doris Investigated daddy’s traveling bag and found a shining, metallic object. Trask called on the Stricklands to receive from Strickland the SIO,OOO and was Introduced to Mrs. Strickland. He asked Robert to visit him at Long Branch and gave him the address on a card. Trask loft, and Mrs. Strickland expressed great anxiety to leave New York. May tried to deceive her husband about her movements on the preceding day. Burke, news agent at Long Branch, returned the lost purse. May told her husband a friend needed her at Long Branch. Strickland found In his wife’s purse the address of Trask on a card. In Trask’s handwriting, and forced her to admit that she went to Trask's bouse alone on the preceding day. Strickland had rushed from the room to kill Trask. Arbuckle produces Mrs. Strickland. She has been very UL She tells of meeting Trask thirteen years before when she was seventeen, and of his Inducing her to go with him, under promise of marriage, to Great Neck, L. I.

CHAPTER XVI. |w a vI'TH the shrewdness of a pracI W 1 ticed lawyer Arbuckle let the case for the defense rest with l6«ea!lj the testimony of May Strickland. The effect on the Jury of her story, he and all others in the courtroom saw. was overpowering. Nothing could be added to it without harming the case for the defense; nothing that the prosecution might do, although the district (attorney strove hard in his afidress, could detract from Its immense effect on the twelve men who held the fate of the defendant in their hands. Judge Dinsmore's charge to the jury was eminently fair, all agreed, and the

newspapers voiced that opinion. The whole city waited at the news tickers, it seemed, to hear the verdict. As is natural and usual in such cases, public opinion was divided. Some argued that Robert Strickland was justified in killing the invader of his home, and these were in the majority. They dwelt on the enormity of Trask's offense and reviled him for not permitting a blameless wife and mother to pursue the happy way of her life in peace. It is to be said to the credit of mankind in the great city that very few- doubted her story. Those who found it in their minds, if not in their hearts, to condemn Strickland dwelt on the enormity of murder even when committed in the heat of passion. Nothing can excuse or extenuate the killing of man, they argued, and to uphold the law Strickland should be compelled to pay the utmost penalty despite his wife's story. To these the majority made answer: “Of what use can it be to kill this man? In the heat of passion he killed another, it is true. But would it not be far better to say to bim, ‘Go and sin no more,’ restore him to his dearly beloved wife and child aud let him take up his new life in Cleveland as carefully planned? It is certain that Robert Strickland will commit no more murder.” The matter of the missing money held the attention of but few. The

great majority of the city’s residents were sure that Robert Strickland was no thief. But It was just that very point that kept the ffry out The decision was very long in coming. The jury had been out for hours. In their room the jurymen discussed every phase of the noted case; but, as they told afterward, from the very beginning there was unanimous agreement that here if ever was a case in which the “unwritten law” liad Jurisdiction. Not a voice was raised in doubt of May Strickland's story. Her manner had convinced the minds of the jurors that she had told the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. The natural abhorrence of all right thinking men for the deliberate home breaker spoke in the voices of the jurymen when they mentioned the name of Gerald Trask. And the mention of the name of Robert Strickland brought forth generally only sympathy. That is, so fhr as May Strickland and his little daughter were concerned. But there were other matters to be considered. Eleven times were the names of jurors called, and each time the name was followed by a different voice, saying: “Not guilty!” The eleventh man had hesitated before pronouncing the words, and his vote was acclaimed by cries of “Good!” “That’s the stuff!” But one juror said: “Wait a moment. Mr. Trumbull hasn’t voted. How do you vote, Trumbull?'V Trumbull, foreman of the jury, replied to the question indirectly: - “Gentlemen, we stand eleven for acquittal and one for conviction!” His decision against Strickland evoked exclamations of dissent and indignation. He was besought to change his vote, to restore Strickland to his wife and child. The jurors thronged about their recalcitrant foreman excitedly, demanding to know why he wanted to send Strickland to the chair. They asked him to put himself iu Strickland's place. Would lie or would he not defend his home, lit like case?

The argument was heated, “Listen to reason, Trumbull!” one juror exclaimed. The foreman replied: “What’s the gocid of sending Strickland to the chair? You don’t bring Trask back to life, do you? All you do is kill off a good, clean, straightforward chap who’s a valuable asset to the community. And who suffers most? Strickland? Not he. Ills wife and his little girl—they're the sufferers. You throw a sensitive woman out on the world and give ) little baby a blot upon her name lbat she'll never be able to wipe out. What’s your idea? Why do you want to convict him?” “I don’t want to convict him. 1 don’t Want to be instrumental in sending any man to his death. I agree with you ail that Strickland had cause for killing Trask.” “But still you vote for conviction.” “fes,” replied Trumbull. “Because I’m not sure that Strickland Went to Trask’s house because of his wife. I’m inclined to think he went there to rob the safe.” There was immediate dissent almost if not quite unanimous. “Strickland's no burglar,” said one man, and another declared. “One look at Strickland ought to convince you that lie’s not a safe cracker.” “I grant you all that, gentlemen,’' said the foreman, “but you can’t dodge the facts. There’s a chain of circumstances woven around Strickland that, to my mind, would damn the Angel Gabriel. Just consider the facts. Strickland was hard pressed. He paid Trask the 510,000 in cash. Why did he pay It in cash? He was the onl; one besides Trask who knew the com. blnation of the safe. A,ud he was on the spot when the safe) was opened. Looks pretty bad, don’t you think?” “Of course it looks bad, but it’s all been cleared up,” said another juror, rising. “We know why Strickland went there.” “There are two things I’d like you to explain to me,” said Trumbull. “Firstly, how did the burglar open the safe? The police officer testified that the turn 4 * biers were in perfect order. Gentlemen, he opened the safe with the combination. And the only source from which he could learn the combination was Strickland. That’s not all. gentlemen. There’s something else you'll have to explain to my satisfaction before I vote for acquittal.” “What’s that?” one of Strickland's defenders asked. “Strickland had that combination on a card. The card was the only really

incriminating evidence against “him. if he’s innocent of the burglary, as you say he is, why did he attempt to destroy the card?” “How do you know he did?” “Why,” said Trumbull, “here’s the card. Don’t you see that it's torn almost in two? And didn’t Glover testify that it was Strickland who tore it?” The jurors looked at the card, and there ensued a heated argument, some contending, others denying, that Stanley Glover, secretary to Gerald Trask, had testified to Strickland’s trying to destroy the card. Trumbull asserted that Strickland attempted to destroy the card in order to wipe out the evidence that would be hound to Convict him. “I don’t think he did attempt to destroy the card,” said one juror. “Yes, he did!" contended another juryman. “No!” “Glover said so!" “I seem to remember Glover saying so.” i “He didn’t.’’ ~ “I don’t know if he did or not” The foreman checked the argument by saying: “We don’t seem to agree about it. We ought to find out, I think.” “Let’s send for Glover and ask him.” suggested a juror. “We can’t do that. We’ll have to gel permission to have his testimony read to us,” said another. “All right; I’ll send a note to the judge,” was Trumbull’s final remark to his colleagues. And the result of the argument was the decision to send to Judge Dinsmore a request to have Glover’s testimony read to the Jury if such action was permitted by the law. In the courtroom the counsel for both sides, the clerk, the stenographer, the attendants and others were waiting impatiently for the verdict when an officer heard the bnzzer calling for him. He hurried to the Jury room and re-entered the courtroom a moment later with a note, which he carried to the private room of the waiting Judge Dinsmora Conspicuous in the courtroom were District Attorney Gray and Dr. Morgan, the physician who had been summoned to the Trask home after the shooting. Morgan and Gray discussed the case in a low voice, their conversation ceasing when the judge entered the courtroom and took his place on the bench. Then the jury entered and took their places and the prisoner was brought in and took his seat. A few seconds later Mrs. Strickland and Doris entered the room and seated themselves beside him. Judge Dinsmoro addressed Arbuckle and Gray. “Gentlemen, I have received a note

from the jury, in which they request that a portion of Glover's testimony be read to them.” And to the stenographer he said: “Turn to Glover's testimony. please. Now read that portion

which pertains* to the tearing of the card, people’s Exhibit A." The stenographer read from his ruinates as follows: “Question by Mr. Gray: ‘Now, Mir. Glover, I call your attention to the fact that the card is torn almost in half. Can you explain how that occurred?’ Answer: ‘Yes; as I took the card from Strickland’s pocket he snatched it out of my hand and started to tear it in half. Before he had torn it all the way I managed to get hold of it again.’ Question—- “ That’s enough,’’ said the foreman of the Jury, and an animated discussion began in the Jury box. While the Jurors discussed the case Dr. Morgan, whispered in an animated manner to Gray and Arbuckle. “Is that all, gentlemen?’’ asked Judge Dlnsmore. “One moment, if your hopor pleases,” said Trumbull, and the discussion was resumed. (‘Concluded in next issue.)

“Look here, Trumbull, will you listen to reason?"

“It’s all been cleared up,” said another juror, rising.

The Prisoner Was Brought In and Took His Seat.