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Show CRIPPEN DIES NOV. 8. Dr. Hawley H. Crippen must die. The English court of appeals has decided against the American dentist found guilty of murdering his wip. It is scarcely two months since Crippen was chased across tho ocean, captured, taken back xo face his accusers, found guilty and sentenced, all in that incredibly short period of time. Americans stand amazed at the swiftness with which English judges and jurors move in that most responsible and serious duty of declaring the life of a human being forfeited. There is something commendable in this speedy administration of law, yet the average American must feel that the English interpretation interpre-tation of a reasonable doubt and the American conception of such a doubt are far apart. Crippen 's whole attitude and his conduct, following fol-lowing the discovery of the evidence of his crime, were self-condemnatory, yet purely circumstantial. The proof of a murder was never fully established. The body found in the Crippen home was not proven to be that of a woman, much less that of Belle Elmore, and still the English judge instructed the jury in a manner to make conviction con-viction a certainty. Tlds is all contrary to the American idea of what is required to establish the crime of murder, calling for the putting to death of the accused. Perhaps there is not a person who read the evidence, who doss not lean to the theory that Crippen murdered his wife, but there are few Americans who would have found him guilty of murder in the first degTee, because Americans are trained to give to the accused the benefit of the doubt, so as to guard against the poscibility of an innocent person suffering a complete miscarriage of just". |