The prison mirror. [volume] (Stillwater, Minn.) 1887-1894, 1892-11-10

injustice which is surely and not very
slowly eating out the life of an Ameri-
can woman. For whatever the opinion
of any individual, or, for that matter,
of the public, as to Mrs. Maybrick's
fault, there is no logical doubt that she
is now confined in prison under a SEN
tence inflicted in defiance of reason and
almost in defiance of law. In the face
of the official assertion that it was
doubtful if murder had been commit
ted at all, this woman, arraigned on the
charge of having poisoned her husband,
was condemned to penal servitude for
life, the sentence being in effect miti-
CATION of the full penalty of the law
for murder. The jury who pronounced
her guilty brought in their verdict in
the very face of the medical opinion
that murder had possibly not been COM
mitted; the judge, whose years and con-
ditiOn entitled him to veneration rather
than to respect as an authority, clinch-
ed their brutality by his sentence. The
counsel for the prosecution declared up
to the last moment that verdict of
guilty could not possibly be rendered.
These facts are all known to the public,
and necessarily, to those officials in
whose power it lies to obtain cOmmu-
tatiOn of the awful punishment. Yet
so far no appeal has sufficed to strike
through the armOr of stupidity, not to
designate it by a stronger term, in which
they have incased themselves. 1t is not
yet too late to save the life and the rea-
son of the unfortunate woman, but her
hold on both is daily growing less; and
unless she is released in the near future.
she will die victim to one of the cruel
est freaks of modern justice.
The English editor of the Rerie,r of
Recieacs has contributed to the current
number of that magazine profoundly
stirring article on the subject of Mrs.
Maybrick'S case. His article contains,
besides close account of the circum-
Stances letter received by him from a
man in South Africa, in which was en-
bodied the dying confession of another
man, to the effect that he had conspired
with woman servant to put poison in
to Mr. Maybricks food and so throw
the suspicion of murder upon the wife.
This confession was sent to Sir Charles
Russell and by him to the solicitors, but
no further notice was taken of it, until
four months later, when a similar COM
municatiOn was received by Mr.. Stead.
who thus had his attention personally
called to the case and certain respon-
sibility thrust upon him. 1t is not up
Oh this confession, however, that Mr..
Stead bases his plea for Mrs. Maybrick,
but Oh the preposterous irregularity of
all the proceedings in the case. Con-
sidered from almost every aspect it was
bOtch and a bungle. The concluding
paragraph of the Stead article sums up
the situation:
1t is unfortunate for England that her peculiar
institutions should come up for review under
such circumstances as this of the Maybrick trial
This American woman sentenced to be
hanged by a judge on the verge of dOtage, after
the counsel for the prosecution had remarked
that it was impossible to find verdict of guilty
in the face of the medical evidence. She was de-
clared by the jury to have been clearly proved
guilty of numbering man. who the home secre-
tary. sitting as court of appeal. declared was
possibly not murdered at all; and she is now
serving sentence which was not pronounced by
the judge for an OffenSe which was neither al
legged against her in the Indictment nor submit
ted to the jury at tral-PiOneer Press
"Incurable,'' or Incorrigible."
l notice that little fragments break Off from
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