| Show OF CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE i p of lid two kinds I lire re pert In cheru a s to the theft a his eH to It from ft III o collateral facts Is nd u we lees they they 1 witted beta establish the tact tend to there In cases ry witness of the tho crimp crime y pr be no rV ew circumstantial tit there may the accused the jury d by ItU says the Ne New York Tork I r his guilt jurors ore are Instructed r nut But the t be Ir the a moral of I J to pd exclude lude an any other rennon ex and to CIrcumstantial el able b theste by ome lome to bo theo theor the deft r be beCU o ln II species of oC proof ry or IDIS nature It Is eau CU IU P bf its Irn irm highest degree of cf tM the Igol writers give In fin tan of there Isn Is homicide by the the ph u lIhr ht re wadding used In the ig the hilt addressed ti cart Irl ot of a letter rge and fount toune upon him ti the ts man m ad where he 1 a anti another III i found d dd dad de d to 10 a rim fm In 0 haste with Ith lL a bloody r out being In the therm person other r nil ns circum rm a ot a are gWenn where d another with deA death th te ee bas haa ha after III hi found ant and 0 the bV latter Here and and again Is no where h dC dlen pf of a wealthY minor Is III he risen from a condition ha a fund isad tD III I In oC the evl el elIna I the Inference that tb Ina night sot not have been enriched by proper tW pry i It h the testy ot of fact t f He ewe a n aY mallY called ailed the best beet evidence u II r I tt bj s may be mistaken or mn may hand circumstances na 00 the other lip danger In that lie Ile The only rie ri d 1 that the minds which f Is II k tt d I nl al Balled to r nelder It may not w be capable of oC drawing the tho proper trey ar and determining whether t n reasonable doubt or contrary hypothesis h Is excluded This delicate I and important duty is 18 to ordinary juries jurle and sometimes grave errors have resulted Ot Of course courle In Inmany inmany many cases casel the plainest minds may draw the same ame conclusions as the wis estas where In cases CaM ot of larceny larcen or burglary burlar th the stolen property properly la Is found upon the prIsoner or where a watch is III found gone rone from the room on the departure of oC the tho prisoner no other ha hav having ing access In the Interval or In n a case of homicide where ot of blood marks ot of conflict and deadly weapons recently Used are found Cound UPon the prisoner r or whore the prisoner It if he denies being at al the scene of oC the crime when It was committed 1 ought to be beable beable able to provo prove that ho he was wall elsewhere bu does not attempt to do so In all th these se cases the tho ot of error may justl be deem d not certaintY Dut he law even enn where human life la Is involved does doea not require absolute certainty Juries will sometimes convict upon lL a collection ot of trivial facts and some sometimes times acquit In the face tace of oC ery con convincing proof Warren the author ot of otTen ofTen Ten a 0 year earl gives the Ule Ids his history tory or y of a 11 trial for murder whore where the accused was wa last seen with the mAn at night armed 1 and going to n a awood wood was found afterward with gold and bank notes having been miserably poor before and his hili victim having reo re received a large sum of money juu be before fore tOle his disappearance was round found wearing some of the victims clothing gave contradictory accounts ot of which way the latter had gone after r leaving him and was wal proved to have said Mid to n a party for tor the hod bod lies Ues far more likely Ilk to be found In Stokesley Beck ek Eleven meven years ears afterward 1 a skeleton by a 11 mark as that of oC the tho missing man was discovered In heck The prisoner was seas ac acQuitted acquitted Quitted On the other hand the instances ot of mistaken convictions are numerous and distressing The Tho same author cites Lord Coke as instancing n a case caso of n a gentleman secured of murdering his hili nIece She Bhe was heard to cr cry out Uncle do not kilt kill me and soon after atter disappeared The rhe uncle being required to produce her and being unable to do doo doso so o procured another girl to fl A JudicIal Study by tho Case by Joseph Josoph F Daly Former Justice I of the Court CoUlt of tho State of Now New York It n n n nl her hut but the fraud was detected and thIs lent such color to the other etc clr that he be Will was convicted an and executed It was afterward found that the niece was living And Sir Matthew Hale H l mentions a case calle In Staffordshire where a 0 man wan wal accused upon strong circumstances of having murdered 1 IL a I missing person and burned burne l him to ashes ashell In nn an oven oen lie Ho was executed and n a i year after aCter the nussing man returned I Warren also allo cites the clue case of at Ambrose who upon uvon circumstantial evidence which It l is said really op at conclusive and was waR gibbeted yet by extraordinary circum circumstances stances survived his supposed lion escaped to foreign parts met the very 1 person for whom he had ben been condemned to die nut Dut th two latter eases occurred at a verY early period before the low III required DR as the first proof ot of murder that the body ot of the victim be produced or recounted 1 for tor In the first case mentioned by Warren It t was as not until discovery ot of the bodY eleven years ears lifter after the first suspicion ot of crime that the acCused could be placed on trial Sir Matthew Hale relates another In instance stance of erroneous ulI conviction upon Ullon the strongest kind ot of presumption It was In the days when horse stealing was a capital offense and n a man having be been n found In possession of a stolen horse was condemned and executed Rt at Ox Oxford Oxford ford assizes And yet ct within two as assizes sizes afterward a 11 man apprehended ap for another robbery robbers und and convicted con can teased that he had the horse and being closely pursued Induced the former prisoner to walk the horse hore for him and escaped and his dupe being apprehended with the horse died Inno innocently A singular clUe case illustrating the un uncertainty certainty both of at positive and circum lit an evidence was Iha t oC the ser servant vant girl Elizabeth Immor Immortalized tallied b by the novella novelist I FIelding to t t whom as 08 a police pollee the proofs In her case were cr submitted She disappeared from home for tor nearly n a month and then returned In rap rage half naked nn and half dead with hunger bunger and told a tale ot of having been kIdnapped In and imprisoned In a house hOIle on the Ile H road whence she escaped b a window She Rhe Shee described the conten contents of hH her e t rI on and they tallied exactly with hope In inthe the tho house houe of oC lL a suspected person on n the Iho road She Identified n a UPS Gypsy woman there ae 1 4 person who robbed her when she was brought to the house bouse The Tho Gypsy was wal put on trial and proved by three that she was at miles away on the day lit of the crime Ont One witness swore to the She and an another another other woman who kept th the house were convicted and Gypsy to tobe tobe be hanged and the oh other r to be branded with a hot Iron on th the hand This brutal punishment was inflicted on the latter but before beCore executing the Gypsy OUs the crown bec became une convinced or the tha truth of her alibi and she phe was par por pardoned Elizabeth Canning was then In l for tor perjury trial thIrty six h witnesses to the absence of the Gypsy aps fro trop th of the alleged crime while twentysix wit nM EI swore swart they the saw her there about that time The Jury found Cound Elizabeth guilty ot of false swearing and she was transported ported l England W was II then alI and continued to hI be for tor l many rears dl s In opinion case CRe all as all readers Are to this fla day dayJohn John Paget of the th London bar gives the history of oC on old trial In Cot W ld illustrating the same flame unreliability of positive all as well us as evidence The steward or r Lady Campden went ent to t village to some Rome rents mid on tit at e ehe hl hl servant John Perry Sent after him This Thill servant did not come bark that nl hl find and his muter master having dUap peered and evidence pointing to foul loul play having b been n John wu was arrested After being tn in ousted 1 a week ho he that mother and brot brother er who had of ofton ton urged him to rob his master attacked the tho latter on the night In question killed him an and 1 burled his bod body No body booy was wall found Cound but the tho evidence was deemed and the two Iwo brothers brothe and ant the mol mother her were executed Some years eara afterwards the th murdered man returned with ot of kidnapping Into fur Cor sign slavery here lIere there wee wa the best the confession and lt of the accused Ing those nearest and dearest to him out to I be e purely nn an Insane In The same author tells ot of a case CUlM where n a dl disappeared III ared and a 11 man found lurkIng In the neighborIng wood and bo be fear was arrested the tho crime and woe was executed In two years the woman returned rho fhe CUed of the confessions ot of alleged ed witches are arc striking instances of oC Insane to of fancied crime but the following cases caus are perhaps without parallel In England about the mid middie die of oC the present century a most ser lIer serIous Ious lous charge was brought t a phy by the husband ot of one of his Pa Patients The accusation followed upon the discovery of oC a diary kept by the lad lady In which was entered with tho utmost t the rl rise e progress and entire history ot of on an overwhelming and nud attachment between her anti the doctor nut hut there was as nothIng to corroborate the astounding disclosures and It Was 1111 established he be yond ond R a doubt that the lady Indy although otherwise conducting herself properly was upon this subject wholly Insane Here lIere It will he 00 ob observed ered that the nb i Bence of oC evidence to cor corroborate the confession saved the doe doc doctor tor The other case tase occurred about the i same lame time also In England A divorce I i action had been pending for several years a wife whose cause was vigorously defended up to the tho house hOUS of lords When there op ap appeared at the bar an elderly and 11 res respectable looking clergyman who de deposed posed upon oath that six or Of sev seven years before belore he had bad been nn an ele wIt wItness ne ness to the tho guilt ot of the lad lady No cor circumstance was wall adduced to tl support Ills hla testimony and within a afew few months the truth come came out The Tho ThorO rO respectable clergyman gave Iao himself up to justice as having been guilty ot of the forgery ot of certain bills of exchange lip Up Upon lipon on Investigation It turned out that tha there had been heen no forgery no such lIuch bills of exchange having over ever been In existence The poor man was simply a 11 lunatic with delusions of crimes committed either by himself or others In III this rose case os as In Inthe inthe the other positive testimony becomes worthless when confronted with facts cannot lie or when unsupported Ib by facts facIa which must exist It if the tho test many mony were true trueH it H Is not altogether unknown that person condemned upon circumstantial evidence e hue have been regarded b by the community as 08 Innocent victims of the theIn In This Thle was waR the popular copular verdict as against t the jurys verdict sr lct In a ca case o oc years ago aKO In London The accused I lIza Ilza l Panning n 22 years ears old was VI 1 a domestic servant She pre 1 a meal b by which the who o tam fam fly lIy W was S poisoned from Crom arsenic contained to In It She herself partook of oC part ot of It and suffered In her lar turn This cIrcum circumstance stance was WIS ue used 1 both bolh for Cor and against III her r She had access to 10 a drawer In which the arsenic WM was kept and this thle I with certain contradictions In her testy many mony and the t fort t lint she had tried to prevent one of the apprentices of oC the family for whom she might ht bp be suspect suspected ed of partiality from partaking of oC the poisoned however he per por in about all there was against her Nevertheless tile the jury jUr against some flome of the best opinions legal and other of the tho time found her guilty guilt and she was executed tier Her boy body lay as asIt asit It were In state In her humble home near high Holborn for five das clays and ond was viewed by an Immense throng A funeral prote slon Iii a which the pall lall was borne b by six young oung women robed in white attended It to the grave TaVe Sir Samuel nom recorded hi his belief bellet In her Innocence and the eloquent Curran j 11 I declaimed on the injustice of oC her fate Nothing Will was over Iver to solve the doubts tiC of her gUIlt or innocence and the author last laRl quoted classes claISe the tho case cale among hl his Judicial problems When the accused In olden times was V ate dl a person of rank and influence It t took tonic a stronger evidence to hang him than It did to do away with a poor servant j tI ere maId The grandfather ot of the poet Cowper who belonged to a powerful family wax placed on trial years agO J the murder of oC a young youn Quaker lady was Va passionately alta attached to him 1 before beloro and after hi his marriage to another an another other It wag RI very t that they left leU her mothers house to late lale one night the next morning I 1 f she was wall found drowned ills account ot of hla ha motives for tor certain Important acts I cane ant was ns contradIctory and he had what 7 poor Ella Fanning had nota motive j J ue he I Ifor for such u a crime Hut But the jury jur gave gayo t a him the benefit ot of the doubt and no nc j quitted him Ile wu was subsequently raised to t the bench and It to 18 pleasant to r 1 know that In his judicial career he was 19 distinguished for caution and mercy meroy t n qualities to which In his hili Jury he may I I J h have c owed his own that ho did not like Gilbert Old Smalley a j n m endeavor deavor to attune for tor the weaknesses s j th ot of his hilt youth by uncompromising eaVer BeVer 1 F d din n It Ity to all offenders brought before him l wa at The Cowper lalO eseo will he found In Ma Macauley Ia cRuley cauley where It Is ably argued for the 1 prisoner The other aide will 11 bo found 1 ton Ion strom by Mr Paget In his j nce JudIcIal Puzzles J d It Is anti and ever will be R a grave rave ClUes ques lloa In lN every rue rase or of circumstantial evl el i Ue li liin dente donee ho how far It II ju justifies u a In a 11 capital case cae The one rule rude to a bo be rk borne In mind I that Ihal the proof must vac tal first fairly warrant the conclusion of e 11 I guilt and ond must exclude every s an another other reasonable the last ter terIs terIs Is the most important on n |
