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Show r MAY TO DECIDE i FATE OP ORPET ii ra DAYS j Judge Overrules Motion of Attorneys for Defense That Verdict of Not Guilty Be Returned. I ; By International News Service, j WAUKEGAN", 111., July 8. Evidence for and against Will Orpet, on trial for t the murder of Marion Lambert, was ' brought to a dramatic close this nfter- noon. At the oleveuth hour the prose-i prose-i cution produced a witness who testified that Orpet bought two cans of cyanide of potassium in a Lake Forest drug store on December SO, 1915, a few weeks bo-fore bo-fore the girl's death. Judge Donnelly then overruled the defense's de-fense's motion that the jury be instructed instruct-ed to bring in a verdict of not 'guilty. yThe case will therefore be given to Vthe jury nert week after the closing pleas of the attorneys. In a few words denying the motion Judge Donnelly said: "I have listened with deep interest to the words -and logic advanced fcv I counsel, but opinions differ. After all, i I think the caso is one for the jury ; to decide. The motion is denied. Court j is adjourned until 9:30 o'clock next I Monday. ' ' ! Absence of Motive. I Mr. Wilkerson's remarks, before the i ruling, were briefly supplemented by Attorney Ealph F. Potter, who, with I Leslie P. Hanna, is associated with Mr. Wilkerson in the defense. Beferring to the analysis of the evidence made by Mr. Wilkerson, Mr. Potter concluded: "The absence of motive for the murder mur-der on the part of the defendant, the unavailability of potassium cyanide to him; its availability to Marion; her motive mo-tive for suicide are uncontradicted facts which have been so firmly established j that if William Orpet should arise in his j 6eat at this moment and assert that he i killed Marion Lambert with cyanide of potassium there is not anybody in this ' courtroom who would not demand that he prove it." Mr. Wilkerson dwelt mainly on the uncontradicted testimony of every chemist chem-ist who testified on the point that Marion Mar-ion died of cyanide of potassium poison, poi-son, and that as four of these experts asserted, the only cyanide available to the defendant, that in the green house on the McCormick estate, of which E. 0. Orpet, father of the prisoner is superintendent, su-perintendent, was cyanide of sodium. Testimony of Experts. 'These chemists, without contradictors contradict-ors ion, testified that to have obtaiued the r Tv our grains of potassium cyanide found " in the girl's stomach, she would have had to have eaten more than two pounds of the poison if in lump form, or to have drunk more than two quarts of a Bolution made from the lumps," declared de-clared Mr. Wilkerson. "Such a con-tion con-tion would be absurd. Thus tho jury, if still suspicious of the defendant, defend-ant, iB left absolutely to guess at the source of supply which Orpet may have had. Not one word of testimony has appeared in the whole case bearing on any other supply than that in the green house. And the law in cases such as this where murder is charged, and particularly where the use of poison is alleged, asserts that possession of the pron must be proved beyond a doubt. The state has not pro'ved this, and the contrary has been proven without contradiction by the defense. Further, uncontradicted evidence has shown that cyanide of the strength used is not available at drug stores. That used was of a purity ordinarily found in few places except laboratories, and the fact that Marion was alone in a laboratory where the pure article was available to her, that boo was there in violation of school rules and that this was on the day before her death, has been clearly shown without contradiction of any sort. ' ' Last of the Witnesses. Witnesses today were Dr. Ralph W. Webster, a rebuttal witness, whose f toss-examination was completed; Fred 1. Wenban, the undertaker into -whoso charge Marion's body was delivered; r H. L. Fraft, a druggist of Lake Forest, the home of the Orpet and Lambert families; E. 0. Orpot and Alexander Allen. Al-len. Only one new element was injected inject-ed into the caso during the dny and that come in the testimony of Mr. Fraft and Mr. Orpet. TTv When he testified before the coro-. coro-. ner's jury last Febraurv the elder Orpet stated that a can of what he then thought was cyanide of potassium, but which turned out to bo cyanide of sodium, so-dium, was the only cvanide on the estate. es-tate. Tie admitted today that as a matter mat-ter of fact at that time two unopened cans bearing the label "cyanide" wore locked up in his office. "Whv didn't you toll the coroner's jurv of these two cans?'' demanded Attorney David R. Joslyu of tho prosecution. prose-cution. "Because I knew Will could not have touched them. They were soldered tight and locked up, undisturbed. They did not belong in the case," replied Mr. Orpet. |