The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-11-01
DurrGnt's testimony does
not agree apith Kinq's.

Durrants testimony does
not agree Nth Kings
But he went in there and tried that gas
burner with match. He says he did not see
the defendants hat and coat on his first visit
TO the library He then sat down to the piano
TO play in an atmosphere that was charged
with gas SO that it made him sick. He had
been playing two or three minutes when sud-
denly at the door appeared this defendant,
without his coat and hat, pale, with distorted
features, congested eyes and disheveled hair,
and, according to his testimony, he says the
defendant stood there in the door and looked
at him for minute. Take the story that the
defendant tells himself Believe, If you can,
that at the time he heard the notes of the piano
he was leaning over the gasburner and
fixing the tips of the sunburner. Suppose he
did what he said he did. Let US follow what
he did next George King says that he played
not more than two or three minutes before
Durrant appeared.
Durrdat told no one about
firing the suRburners.
Durrant says that he heard George King
while he was at the sunburners. He arranged
the electric spark apparatus. He replaced the
refectors. busted them off, walked the space
over the top of the ceiling, descended the
ladder, lifted down the ladder, tried the valves
that turned on and off the gas, walked down
the steps OF the gallery down to the audi
forum, crossed the auditorium to the rear, de-
scended the attic stairs and burst on Kings
vision two or three minutes after he had sat
down to the piano. | submit that no man
could go through all this performance in the
time that he says he did. What the mat
ter with these burners that required fixing?
Nothing so far as we know. He never told
human being except Blanche Lamont, the dead
girl George King, the organist and his mother
what he was doing or going to do. Not word
to the janitor or trustees or to any other human
being.
The mother Of the prisoner
IS m0ued to tears.
Bunch all these denials together and what
are you going to do2 What about the aggre-
gate collective mass of damning facts? To
what Irresistible a candid
mind arrive? Durrant has helped to convict
himself by robbing the dead. Why he should
have taken the rings of murdered girl God
alone knows. But he took them, and as he
dragged them off that girls stiffening fingers
he must have felt in his dank and flabby hair
the first cold breath of the harvest that was to
come. AS he had sowed so he should reap.
He had sowed misery, blood, sorrow and tears.
He shall reap detection and exposure.
1t was at this point that Mrs. Durrant's
long-pent feelings gave way under the ter
rlble strain. She wept silently on the
prisoners shoulder, until the customary
called to order again Mr.. Barnes spoke
feelingly of the incident:
Tn crime the guilty suffer
1odth the innocent.
While was talking before the adjournment
there was before you, gentlemen, a very sad,
feeling. We are not here-1 would not speak of
1t, gentlemen, but l consider 1t my duty to do
so-we are not here, you are not here under
your oath, nor am here under my oath to try
this case upon anything but the evidence of
the law. IT is perhaps one of the saddest phases
of crime that with the guilty suffer the inno-
cent. 1t Is always so. 1t is unfortunate, it is
unhappy, but it is nevertheless true. / can ap-
preciate TO the full and sympathiZe with, to
the bottom of my heart, the grief that comes to
the unfortunate relatives OF this defendant
who listen to the analysis of the evidence.
Their sympathies are entwined around the OBJ
ject to whom this analysis applies, and yet as
strings Of these relatives. 1t is unfortunate,
gentlemen, but there is something else to be
considered.
Consider the euoc Of the mother
in Montana.
While | sympathize with this unhappy
call your attention. Remember the 10th day
OF April, when the body of this mangled girl
escorted by her little sister, was taken to her
mother sat in tears and sorrow waiting to
receive the meager little body from which life
had been strangled in San Francisco, waiting,
watching, listening for the little footsteps that
would never be heard again. listening for the
gentle voice stilled in death, yet in the hope of
meeting again that little girl whose life had
been taken.
Now in regard to the testimony of Open
helm. Do you doubt it? What motive could
lead Mr.. Phillips in a matter where it was per-
fectly Indifferent 10 him whether the defend.
ant were acquitted or not, engaged in making
his own living, having nothing to do with my
department., or captain Lees or theodore Dur
rant, totally and wholly uninterested, it MAX
ing no difference to him whether this man
were acquitted or not-why, / say, should
Phillips come here and testify that outside
oppenheim's pawnshop he saw the defend
ant, Theodore Durrant?
Are all the witnesses banded
fa q conspiracy against Durrdntf
Is he joined in the conspiracy with Mrs.
Leak, Martin Quinlan, Mrs. Crossett Miss Lani-
gan and Miss Pleasant and the other witne sses?
Has he joined with all those to swear away the
life of an innocent man? Phillips did not
know Oppenheim to speak to, nor did he
know any OF the other witnesses and Open.
helm did not know that there was such a
man as Phillips IN existence. Is this then
another case of failure of Identification? Is it
the same mistake that Mrs. Vogel and the
other witnesses made? The contention is made
that 1t might have been Lenihan that he saw.
You have seen the difference between Leni-
hans ring and that of Blanche Lamont You
have seen him with Durrant's oyercoat on.
They do not look any more alike than I look
like Captain Lees Where are any of those
nine men who saw Lenihan's mustache? We
have had something from Mr.. Peixotto from
General Dickinson and from Mr.. Deuprey
about echo answering. Now it is my turn and
I ask, "Where," and echo is silent.
The same defense made By the
first murderer.
Oppenheim saw the man who brought the
ring to him. Phillips saw the man, but did
not see the ring. He tells you how his hair
was worn on that occasion. He tells Won of a