Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1882-03-16
TIE Csnyicfion OF Larson.

O0tlV8AOu Va A01SV0e
In tie opinion of the New York
World, which has all along manifested
an extraordinary degree Of interest in
the trial of the American doctor, Lam
son, in London, which has just termi.
mated in verdict of guilty and the SEN
tence Of the prisoner to the gallows, it
is tolerably clear that foreigner: has
been doomed to death bya British jury
on evidence which would scarcely have
led to- such a verdict had the prisoner
been a British subject Our contem-
porary attributes this partly "to the ma
tural dulness of the British mind and
partly also to the virulence and malignity
Of the charge delivered by the judge"
This latter the World denounces as a
miracle of Injustice paraphrasing
the sentiment expressed concerning the
celebrated deliverance of Chief Justice
Cockburn in the Tichborne trial. 1t
declares that the Judge abdicated the
legitimate functions of his Office for the
purpose ofmaking an. elaborate argu-
ment against the prisoner, and claims
that he persistently "slurred over all
the circumstances which went to show
that Lamson had taken no trouble what
ever to conceal his treatment OF his
brother-in-law, and to have dwelt with
stolid emphasis upon everything which
could be possibly cited in support of the
theories and assumptions of the British
medical pundit, Stevenson, whom the
case seems to have been SO managed as
to advertise with extreme li5crality."
People who have followed the
evidence will feel inclined to agree
with our contemporaries judgment
that there were points in the
defense that seemed to be entitled
to more considerati ion than was accorded
them by the jury, who swept aside as
of little or no weight the expert testi-
mony invoked during the progress Of the
trial. This latter went to show that the
test OF aconitine by taste was unreliable,
because other pOisons have similar
flavor that other physicians had given
the boy morphi,, which it was at least
possible might have produced death,
and that he had very weak co:istitu-
tion it was also developed that the lad
was suffering from curvature OF the spine
and was liable to die at almost any time:
that among his numerous complaints
were neuralgia and rheumatism, for
which .conitine is a remedy, and that
moreover young John was in the habit
Of experimenting with poisonous drugs
in his chemical studies. Even in the
testimony of Stevenson, upon which the
crown hinged its case, the admission oc-
ours that the symptoms Of aconitine poi
soninG were unknown and that death
might have resulted from the drugs
used by the boy or from the morphia
| administered by another physician.
From an examination Of the me lsre ,e-
ports of the evidence which have reached
this country it seems tolerably clear that
a reasonable doubt existed not only in
one but in several OF the theories and
hypothesis which the crown sought to
establish, and tha. the jury in its llasty
verdict, which old lawyers are said to
have declared they saw expressed on the
jurors faces even before they left the
box, failed to give the prisoner the
benefit of the doubt that seemed to sur.
round the vital phases of the case. Lam
| son may he guilty, but it is not at all
certain that the evidences OF it have
been made SO clear that jury OF his
countrymen would have sent him so
quickly to the gibbet.