The Middleburgh post. [volume] (Middleburgh, Snyder Co., Pa.) 1883-1916, 1889-10-17
Th6 HabGaS Corpus Hearing.
The Court Grants a Contin-
uance.

On Friday, the 11th inst, His
Honor, Judge Bucher, held the hd-
6eds corpus hearing in the case Of
Martin Deitrick, charged with the
murder of Charles Hane. The
Courtroom was well filed with an
interested audience, gathered from
all parts of the County. The prisoner
was accompanied by his sister. q
bright girl of about 15summers, two
brothers and his aged and grief
stricken mother, strong in her belief
of her sons innocence.
The Attorneys for the defence at
the outset very properly declined to
concede anything respecting the
manner young Hane came to his
death, and the medical and other
testimony was produced to show
that death resulted from pistol shot
wound, and that suicide was improb-
able.
The testimony respecting the find
ing of the body, etc, was substan-
TALLY the same as that taken at the
Inquest and already published. An
attempt was then made by the Com
monwealth to show probable cause
for holding the prisoner for action
by the Grand Jury by evidence that
he had revolver on his person the
day of the murder that he had pur-
chased five cartridges at T.. r. Hot
tenstein's store two days before the
murder, the balls of which appeared
to be similar to the ball taken fe5ln
the body Of Hane. DIR. Wagcnseller
testified that two of the barrels of
the revolver which the prisoner pro-
duced before the Inquest on request
were more moist than the other
three barrels, indicating that they
had been fired, and that four of the
barrels were loaded and one empty.
This seemed to tally with the pris-
oner's statement before the Inquest,
that he had fired only one of the car
tridges ut II trespassing dog. The
defense experienced considerable
difficulty i'll finding out where the
prisoners revolver was kept. The
Attorneys for the Commonwealth
refusing the repeated requests from
the defendants S counsel on this point.
Finally the desired information was
extracted from Squire Gaugler by
cross-eXamination, and the defend
ants counsel We're finally promised
an opportunity to inspect the weap-
on. We could not see the propriety
of hesitation about this. The mur-
derer should if possible be brought
to justice, but no obstacles should
be thrown i'll the way of any prisoner
charged with so grave an offense, or
of his counsel, to make necessary
and legitimate preparation for de-
fense. A young man by the name
OF Brosius, who acted as bartender
ut the Ferry House the night of the
dance, testified that Deitrick exhib-
tied some kind of coin which he
believed to be n twenty-dollar gold
piece, but that he was not positive,
as he saw it by the light of "A kero-
sene-oil lamp, and the prisoner stood
some ten or fifteen feet distant, and
he judged it to be a twenty dollar
gold-piece by the size of the piece
and talk of the prisoner. This
talk" was remark made by him
that he didn't want to break the coin.
This was all the evidence of any i'm
portance presented at the hearing,
and it must be said fell far short of
what would naturally be expected in
a case of such gravity. In all, about
one dozen witnesses for the Com
monwealth were examined. The
Commonwealth, recognizing the
weakness of the prosecution, asked
for time to produce more evidence.
Even under the stringent ruling of
the courts that the Commonwealth
in such cases need only show prob
able cause for holding the prisoner
for trial, it was evident that the
Court was not satisfied Of the pro-
priety of holding Deitrick on the
evidence presented, and granted a
continuance of the hearing until
Tuesday the 22nd inst.