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Show WEST BROOK PEGLER Skulduggery in the Courts AFTER Jimmy Petrillo was acquitted in federal court in Chicago, Congressman Fred A. Hartley, co-author of the Taft-Hartley labor emancipation law, said he wasn't any too sure that the department of justice was leveling in this case. I have been thinking the same thing about other union cases and some other department of justice Jobs. They are getting very careless. You know what leveling means, of course. It is a poetic term from the prize fighting racket. To level is to put forth your best efforts, as tha uize fight commissioners say. Lots of times I have thought that the department of Justice didn't put forth its best efforts in oases involving nnion gorillas or moving picture people or ideological refugees. There is a fact about the duty of the federal judges which few of us know and most of those few seldom remember. A federal judge Is supposed to sniff out skulduggery done In his presence and to denounce any obvious crookedness or negligence on the part of the district attorney whether for benefit of the government or of the defendant. I dare say there have been cases where federal judges had scolded district attorneys for bearing down unfairly on defendants. But I challenge you to cite any case where a judge got disgusted and bawled out a prosecutor for willful and obvious neglect of the people's Interest and failure to do his best. I say it is high time one of them did. |