Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 38, Number 49, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 March 1906 — IS JUSTICE TO BE DEFEATED? [ARTICLE]

IS JUSTICE TO BE DEFEATED?

It is now nearly two years since the McCoy bank closed, under circumstances which, to say the least presented strong appearance of criminality on the part of the chief active manager of that institution. No one has as yet been brought to trial for this bank wrecking, and wholesale robbery which preceded it, and by the time anyone can now. be possibly be brought to trial, on any indictments now pending, over two years will have elapsed since the bank failed, and if for any reason, no punishment is secured on them,’ then the statute of

~— 7 ”—— limitations will intervene, and no further prosecutions can be instituted. If any or both of the accused parties are guilty as charged, they ought to be convicted; if they are innocent they ought to be declared so after a full and fair trial. And we are not saying that anyone is guilty of intentional crime, but we do repeat what we said above, that the circumstances strongly indicate guilt, and of a very flagrant character also. So much so at least that hundreds of persons who have suffered loss by this failure, as well as the best interests of the community at large, demand that the guilt or innocence of the suspected parties be fully shown in a court of justice. Look at some ot the self-evident eiicumstances of the case: For years Tom McCoy, the evident chief manager of the bank, had been wasting the money of the depositors in wild and profligate extravagance. In an excessively and unnecessarily expensive household establishmebt here, with probably an average of at least two hired lackeys to wait on„every member of the family. With a big barn full of SSOO and SI,OOO turn outs, SIOO dogs to give away and S2OO guns to throw in the riverjand with another big e-tab’.ishment on the fiver, where a whole colony of dissolute ••river rats’’ were supported the year around, on the depositors’ money, just to wait on King Tom and his guests. And not to speak of another still more expensive establishment in Chicago, the ex istence of which was known only to a chosen few. And also a son after his own heart, who was wasting hundreds-of dollars every month in supposed preparations, (for bouncing) for the Naval Academy and Harvard. All this time Tom was piling up a debt against himself at the bank, at the rate of SI,OOO a month, and which he could not fail to know must sooner or later result in the bank’s destruction. And all this time, but especially toward the last when all his action showed that he knew the inevitable crash was not far off, he was using every effort to draw more and more people into his toils. Every device and argument was used to get more money into the bank for him to squander. Poor widows aud helpless old people were his special victims, and were prevailed upon by secret offers of excessive interest, to place their all within his reach. Others, business ‘men aud working nen were induced, often against their better judgment, by the claims of friendship and the ties of fraternity, to leave their life time savings in his hands* And all this timq he must have known that the bank was insolvent, and so knowing, every principle ot justice demands that he should receive the penalty which the law prescribes for such crimes. As to Uncle Mac, appearances are not nearly so strong against him. Still facts that developed after the failure are such that the people have a just right to demand that he prove his innocence in a court of justice. Booh facts, for instance as his secret deed years i befofe of the bank building to his wife, the deeding of half his Hanging Grove land to his daughter, the

large buying of land in Missouri in the name* of his son-in law, the appointment of this son-in-law as his assignee, toget her with the systematic attempts that have been made since the failure *to “hog” the estates which should have gone to the creditors, by such means as the preposterous; Rinehart claims, all strongly tend to show that he too knew the condition of the bank loug before its failure, and deliberately planned to get everything possible out of it, regardless of the rights of the depositors. But at the present time, the pros pect that these men. or either of them, will be compelled to establish their innocence in a court of justice or receive therefrom the deserved penalty if guilty is not very promising.

After the failure, numerous in--.*l jured depositors, with commedible alacrity, filed affidavits against them. Later, these were replaced by regular indictments, by a grandjury under advice of the regularly constituted public prosecutors, and for h time it seemed that they would be brought to a speedy trial. Later, however an expensive at torney from outside the circuit was engaged to take full control of these prosecutions, and whose first act was to dismiss all these pending indictments, and after the inevit able long delay, to secure others of his own drawing. With tie only apparent result, so far. of consuming a large amount of time. And waste us time and delaying of trials is evidently the main hope of the accused parties to defeat the ends of justice. Therefore, as we say above, if by any possibility they can tie brought into court on the present indictments, yet if by reason of some technicality, or hair splitting application of law or rules of evi dence, they escape on these pend ing indictments, they will escipe entirely, for after the 18th of the coming April, their offense will be oat-lawed. But there is still one chance to prevent this possible defeat of justice. And to suggest which is the purpose of this article. It is to have another grand-jury in tie coming April term of our circuit court, with a view .of procuring still another batch of indictments against the supposed bauk wreckers. And to do this onr own legally con stituted prosecutingjattorneys will be sufficient, without any expensive legal help from outside the circuit, Judge Hanley has always showfl a most commendible disposition to meet the just demands of the people in this matter, and we are confident he will call another grand jury, if the people show that it is their wish that it be done. These new indictments would in no way interfere with those -now pending, and if they were known to be hanging over the accused parties, in reserve, they might have a strongly deterring effect on them and their astute lawyers, in any furthnr attempts to (avoid a trial. Possibly prevent Tom from having any more bad spells with his liver, just in the nick of time, or the lawyer from having to go to Milwaukee to get any more relatives out from under the shadow of the penitentiary.