The semi-weekly miner. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1882-1886, 1885-11-11

Our contemporaries, the Inter Mountain,
the Town Talk and the VAUDEVILLE News,
all incline to the belief that John Foley
was insane when he attempted the life OF
the woman Flick and her Italian escort
and ended his own miserable existence.
The facts in the case do not warrant any
such belief. He was a man OF vicious dis
position, and gave way to his bad temper
on the slightest provocation. The assault
he made on the woman Flick at the To-
ledo on Thursday evening was not an un-
usual act for Foley. Away back in Durango
ne on two occasions, to our KIN Owledge, got
into trouble for beating and it is
only a lew weeks since he hit a woman in
one OF the boxes at the Comique with his
only too ready revolver. He had aquarrel
with the woman Flick and perhaps felt
som sort OF love for her; her evident desire
to "shake him" wounded his pride, and he
made up his mind to "lord it over her." He
would punish her for her course and regain
his old place in her favor through fear.
This is the custom of a w%ell-known class in
the West, who live with women of easy vir-
tue, and, only too frequently, upon their
earnings. Such acts OF brutality are common
daily occurrences upon Park, Galena and
Wyoming streets, the perpetrators of
which would feel insulted if it was even
limited that they were crazy. So far we
have seen no signs OF insanity in the man. !
Friday and Saturday nights he was at his (
post OF duty at the Comique, giving entire
satisfaction and not exhibiting the least /
sign Of insanity. When the theater closed
he appeared perfectly rational and did not |
act strangely in any place that he entered
subsequently,. He went into one place and
filling a glass to the brim with whisky
drank it off. As he passed out he said that
it was the last drink he would ever take in
house, showing that he meditated the
act. He was subsequently seen at a num-
Der Of places, acting nationally in all oil
them. Within an hour OF the time when
be committed the crime he was seen by peo.
pie and they all attest that he appeared to
be sane. He then secreted himself at a
point which he knew his pool, defenseless
victim would have to pass. He adopted
the tactics OF the wild cat and the lion, but
not of the maniac. There isn't a bit of
to warrant the assumption that
he was insane. The man is dead. 1t mat
little whether he was sane or insane.
10 far as he is concerned, but it makes a
,reat difference to the living. If he had
simply killed the woman and not himself.
lis attorneys would have entered the ever
plea Of insanity and want Of respon-
and secured his release. We
want to protest against the legal insanity
lodge. It has become so that people no
believe that there are men so brutal
,icious and desperate to whom crime is
a rational state OF mind. No
,ooner ia a great crime committed than we
lear the cry OF insanity. The public mind
must set itself against this maudlin senti-
nent. 1t is a trick of the legal profession,
md has cheated the gallows out OF more .
roper subjects than all other causes COM
lined. 1t may seem harsh to insist that
he dead nan Foley was perfectly respons-
Bile for his act, but justice to the living de- ]
aands that the sickly sentimentality of the !
ourt-room be probed and laid bare. Foley 8
) before a Higher Tribunal, from the de /
rees OF which there lies no appeal. But we g
now not what desperate man will to-day '
boot down a defenseless woman or a ,
equitable man, and we want to see no man
rho wilfully and premeditatedly takes hu-
nan life escape the g~allows. We want the
nurderers made so sure of ignoble death as I
. strike terror into the hearts Of the cow
rds who 60 through the world with their
ands on the handles Of their revolvers. t