The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1893-06-20
it is contradiction as to her
capacity and character.

morals, IL is CONTRADICTION as TO ner
physical capacity and character.
After speaking in terms of praise of
the action of the prosecuting officers
whom, he believed, had done their duty
conscientiously, Gov. Robinson said:
l said the case was brought to the
district attorney by the Fall River police.
have not time to 60 into sarcasm or
denunciation of these gentlemen. They
are like great many bodies of police
that you find in all communities. Police
men are human, made out of men and
nothing else, and the blue coat and the
brass buttons only cover the kind of
man that is inside, and you do not get
the greatest ability in the world inside a
policeman's coat. You may, perhaps,
get what you want and what is sufficient,
but you must only call upon him for such
services as he can render.
Now when police officer undertakes
to investigate crime he is possessed
and saturated with the thoughts and ex-
periences he has with bad people. He is
drifting and turning in ways of finding
criminal, magnifying this, minimizing
that, throwing himself on one side in
order to catch somebody, standing be-
fore community that demands the
detection and punishment of the crimi-
nal, blamed if he does not get somebody
into the lookup before morning.
'what are the Police Doing?"
say the newspapers, and the newspa-
pers, you know, are not always right,
mostly saying to him. Look here, MI.
City Marshal, these murders were COM
mitted yesterday. Haven't you the
murderer in the lookup? Get somebody
| in.''
Now they are sensitive to all those ex-
pressions. Naturally, as men feeling
the responsibility of their office,
they go there and do just such
work as that in that way. That can on
ly be expected of them, and when they
come upon the witness stand they reveal
their weakness, do they not?
| They knock their own heads together.
They make themselves, as body of
men, ridiculous, insisting that defend
ant shall know everything that was done
on particular time, shall account for
| every moment of that time, shall tell it
three or four times alone. shall never
waver or quaver, shall have tears OF not
| have tears, shall make no mistakes. But
| they, stripped of their blue clothes, and
| in their citizens garb, show themselves
| to be only men here, and liable to hui
| man infirmities and errors.
| Now, dismiss them without any un-
pleasant reflections. / will talk about
| them little later on, but have nothing
! to say now, any more than this, that you
| must not ask of them more than they
ought to give. You must not be surprised
| that they fail even of the standard that
they set up for everybody else. So say
to you, as distinguished advocate in a
similar case expressed himself to the
jury: ''This defendant comes before you
| perfectly satisfied that the jury is the
most refreshing prospect in the eyes of
accused innocence ever met in human
| tribunal"
Now, gentlemen, it is not your business
to unravel the mystery. You are not
here to find out the solution of that prob
| lem, you are here not to find out who
committed the murders, you are nothere
i to pursue anybody else You are simply
and solely here to say, is this woman de-
fendant guilty? That is all, and though
the real criminal shall never be found.
better million times that than that you
find verdict against this woman on un-
sufficient evidence and against your hu-
man experience and contrary to the law,
SO that an unhealthy appetite may be
satiated and blood given that belongs to
the owner of it beyond anybody's taking.
| Not who did it? Not how could it have
been done, but did she do it?
Governor Robinson then began a
chronological description of events con-
nected with the crime and it's discovery
as they appear from the evidence. Liz
zie's varying statements as to being in
the yard were readily reconciliable. The
testimony of three men prove that Ru-
binsky saw the defendant coming to the
house from the barn, and therefore her
statement of her whereabouts at the
time of the murders was true. The
ring buried with Mr.. Borden shows her
affection for him. The custom of lock-
ing the doors was not to lock the daugh-
ters from the parents, but for protection.
He said there is absolutely no direct
evidence against Miss Borden. Nobody
saw, heard or experienced anything to
connect her with the tragedy.
Mr.. Robinson proceeded to dispose of
certain points of the prosecutors evil
| dence in detail. The proposition that
the prisoner must have seen Mrs. Bor-
denis body when up stairs is unsound.
Gov. Robinson said: She is shown to
have gone up stairs to her room, the
government says, about ten minutes be-
fore 10, and she must have seen, as they
claim,
The Dead Body of Mrs. Borden,
as she, the defendant, went up and down
the stairs.
Now, let us look at that, because that
is an important feature in the case; i'm
portant for the Commonwealth, i'm
portant for the defendant. You went
there and saw the situation. You know
how the stairs go up, winding around as
you go up, and at the top OF the landing
you are right there at Miss Lizzie's door.
When you stand at the top of the laud-
ing you cannot see in the guest chamber.
You know it is as if you stood over
where the officer stands or little fur
ther; you are not looking into the door
at all. 1t is like good many houses
/ where you come up at the top and are
looking in both doors at the same time.
Then it is said that certain point on
the staircase, right on one tread, if you
| look in under the bed, across the floor OF
the guest chamber, you could see any
object that was over between the bed
and the bureau, and you were all asked