| Show IRWIN MURDER TRIAL 81 STARTED ARTED NEW YORK Nov 7 UP Rob ert Irwin whose attorney h ht hE says is is crazy crazy as a bedbug jauntily into court today to answel for the murders Of a Beautiful ar model and tw two other person whom he killed in the early hours oj of Easter Sunday 1937 The t O 31 V 31 31 year Old i t O 31 V 31 31 year Old i Preachers Preacher's son artist artif and asylum his graduate-his pallid pallid pal pal- lid face bearing evidence of the year year and nd a half he has spent in jail awaiting atinS trial-entered trial the courtroom court court- roo room three minutes after general sessions Judge James Garrett Vallace Wallace Wal Val lace mounted the bench Samuel cJ Irwin Vl smiled at his attorney Leibowitz Flanked by tw two six-foot six guards he sat down at the council table to watch the selection of a blue ribbon jury which will be asked asked- to decide whether he shall go to the electric chair for slaying lovely Veronica Gedeon her year 54 old mother Mary Gedeon and Frank Byrnes year old lodger in the Beekman Hill apartment apart apart- ment The slight defendant cast castone castone castone one look at the audience turned his back and sat down He wore a neat pin striped suit of oxford gray a gray striped shirt dark tie and shoes His wavy brown hair was Carefully trimmed and combed His sallow slightly pinched face made him seem older than his 31 years From time to time as filed behind his chair on their way the bench to plead legal excuse for not serving Irwin slouched in his chair and picked at his finger nails It appeared likely that more than one day would be required to pick picka a jury from the panel of tales tales- men especially sele selected ted on the basis of character and intelligence The jury will have to decide whether or not the erratic sculptor was sane when he strangled Veronica Veronica Veronica Ve Ve- Ve- Ve ronica and her mother and stabbed Byrnes to death with an ice pick Never Ne Lost One to Chair Leibowitz who has never lost a client to the electric chair will present present present pre pre- sent psychiatrists who will say that Irwin was not sane It will be a battle of psychiatrists similar to that of the Loeb-Leopold Loeb trial in Chicago Chicago Chicago Chi Chi- cago or that of Harry K Thaw for the slaying of Stanford White here Leibowitz said the trials trial's importance importance importance tance lay not in what happens to Robert Irwin but in focusing public public public pub pub- lic attention on the need for re revamping revamping revamping re- re vamping New York states state's archaic laws on criminal insanity Under New York law a killer cannot be executed if it is proved that at the time of the deed he did not know the nature and quality of the act nor that the act was wrong Irwin confessed in Chicago three months after the triple slaying that because his love had been spurned by the elder sister of the artists artist's model Ethel he had committed the murders She had married another man Joseph Kudner He said that he ie had wanted to murder Ethel but Veronica known as Ronnie attempted to lure him away from her tier while he was a lodger in Mrs Mary Gedeon's rooming house Ir Irwin Irwin Irwin Ir- Ir win said h he went to the Gedeon home the Saturday night before I Easter and lay in wait for Ethel Mrs Gedeon was at home but didn't want to talk to him She asked him to leave Then Irwin confessed confessed confessed con con- he choked her to death and shoved her body under a bed Still he waited for Ethel Ronnie came home He had to kill her because because because be be- cause Mrs Gedeon's body lay under the bed He beat her to death with witha a piece of soap wrapped in a cloth Then Irwin confessed he realized that his crimes would be discovered by Frank Byrnes a roomer in the Gedeon home who was asleep in his room He silenced Byrnes by stabbing him |
