The Sunday critic. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-19??, 1883-12-16

uiStSu anu dt the november ERIN 100
he was tried and acquitted. Most every
one is familiar with the defense in tina
case. 1t was shown that the deceased
had attempted to force his,way into List:
house with aSdrawn pist5f,and was sho
and ,theJury deemed the killing justifca
bic as indeed it was. On the 9Th day o
September 1883 just twenty years afte
the commission of the first crime Levi
F. List son of the preceding shot anc
killed George B. Taylor, and his father
being connected with the affair was ar
rested as an accessory. Everybody i.
aware of the proceedings Lewis F. Lis
was convicted of "Murder of the frs
degree" and Lewis List of murder o.
the second degree and, unless there i.
some interference the young man will be
hung on March I4th, and the old man
will end Ills miserable existence in the
county Jail. But singular circumstance
In the case was that at the trial of the
elder List in 1868 his wife with her infant
son, sat in front of the dock awaiting the
verdict as 10 her husbands guilt, and
twenty years after she sat in front of the
dock again TO hear the verdict as to her
husband and to that son now grown a
man and on trial for his life. George
Gray, Esq, was prosecutor in both cases
being Deputy in 1868 and Attorney
General in 1883.
AS to the righteousness of the verdict
we will not express an opinion. New
Castle Comfy has been treated to some
remarkable verdicts in the past few years.
and this one is no exception. That the
jury may have been solicitous for the
good of society is possible, but that the,
manifested any great degree of intelli-
g nee is clearly aettled by the very
remarkable verdict. The efforts of the
defense after the verdicts were entirely
proper, and their point was we'll taken
against the form of the verdict, and the
decision of the Court by no means settled
satisfactorily the important question Of
aw involved. The cases cited by the
iefense were to the point, and the cases
cited by the State we're not entirely salts
factory in rebutting them. 1t can be un
lerstood how one of two defendants might
in an unreasonable passion kill another,
While the other have cool design t.
;ause death by working upon the feel
ngs of the slayer, and it would be unjust
to hang the slayer for the sake of punish
ing the instigator. But the question Of
murder and manslaughter was not in this
verdict.
Both were convicted of murder, one OF
the second degree, and the other of the
first degree, and the elder List WIS
.harged with aiding and abetting his son
who was convicted of murder in the first
degree. That there was room to imply
malice on the part of the young man is |
certain, but no such thing could be
entertained in favor of the elder List, liz
his son was guilty of murder in the first
degree) he was aiding and abetting, and
they should have been convicted of the
same offense. It it was clear to the jury
that they were just to the elder List, the
younger should have received the same
penalty. 1t was surely not sympathy for
the old man that led them to favor him.
for his previous bad character had much
to do with the prejudice against them,
which surely worked them disaster. We
hope that this point may be further con
sidered in all its bearings. Murder and
in the same verdict ma,
De possible, but combination of the two
different degrees passeth all understand.
ng.