The herald., 1898-09-27
The SECRET ARRESTS
MORE ATTORNEYS EXPRESS
THEIR OPINIONS
The Absolute Indefensiiblity Of the
System-What Such Tactics
Have Done for France

If the police department can derive any
cons o,ation from the fact that hardly
| lawyer in the city, with the exception Of
| I. E. Gibbon of the police commission.
whose speciality is civil-not crim!nal-law,
agrees with It in its notion that t has the
right to adopt the Weylerian tactics of
placing persons incommun!cado it Is en-
titled to it, A number of the best attor-
news in town have been interviewed on
| this subject, and there is unan!mity Of
| opinion that the police are acting in d.
rect defiance of the law in their acts Of
sequestratlng persons during their pleas
ure, in order to dig up evidence against
| them which is not on hand at the time of
their arrest. Some of the opinions given
yesterday are as follows:
| Horace Bell have often expressed my
self on this subject at the police station at
| the court rooms and in the press. 1t is sim
! ply an outrage on the whole people to de-
prive any man Of his rights under the
| law, which is what the department does
right along. The law is very plain. The
prisoner must be taken before the nearest
magistrate without unnecessary delay"
That does not mean that a man can be
| kept in jail until the detectives can w9rk
up d CdSc dSdIHSl ii4iil Jul tiilI ilc Aitst
be treated as the law says, with a defer
ence to his natural rights under the con-
stitution. Don't you see 1t attacks the
guarantee of liberty we all enjoy and
thereby endangers the prime basis of
American institutions? Such practice. if
persisted in, removes all safety. The law
is good enough. Let me tell you a case in
point. ! remember when Judge Cheney was
hit it off together. but Cheney was all
right in his place. We had some hot times
together, though in this case l had no
complaint to make of his conduct. One
time, this was many years ago, YOU must
remember, l happened into the jail and
found that a Let Of prisoners had On the
heavy cross chains that the Mexicans use;
they weigh about forty pounds The Gus
tom had been Inherited, you see, from the
Mexican regime. and the chains had been
Knocking about the jail and had been used
by successive jail0rs and sheriffs S an
easy way of making the safety Of their
prisoners absolute. l told Cheney Of this
and he was Mortified He called the sheriff
before him. ! should tell you that l had
only brought this before the courts atten-
ton Informally, though intended if moth
ing was done t. try the effects Of a habeas
corpus proceeding. The judge asked the
sheriff what he meant by loading men with
chains in that harbarous manner The
sheriff replied that he had to do IT. that
the jail was 50 Insecure that they would
escape If they were allowed u be unfet-
tered. Let them escape then" said the
judge. "If the county Of Les Argeies can
not take care of its prisoners without go-
ing back 10 sixteenth century methods
they had better escape. Mr.. Sheriff, yCu
will not use those chains any more" The
order was obeyed and the sheriff If
course, soon found proper methods of
keeping his prisoners without loading
them down with iron. The same principle
applies to this case. No, sir; if the police
men or their kind when they make an ar
rest cannot take their man before a mag
istrate they had better not make arrests
that depend on such procedure.
Deputy District Attorney James-There
can he no difference of opinion, | think
among lawyers as to the meaning of the
term unnecessary delay" 1t means that
the prisoner must be taken before ma gis-
trate as quickly as possible, other things
being equal II court is not open he, Of
course can be held until Il IS ready for
bus ness, but it does not mean that man
can be arrested and then held until the
prosecuting officers get enough evidence
to convict him. The law provides for
delay Of six days for the prosecution
two days at time when It is shown that
such time IS needed-and If in six days after
a man is arrested the evidence cannot be
had to convict him it is certainly dan
gerous to our institutions to try to devise
some plan to override the plain intent of
| the law
| Hon. Abbot Knney-It Is military poll
tics. 1t is the beginning Of the same prin-
ciple which has led in France TO the Drey-
fus crisis. II is simply ntolerable that
such practices should be allowed in Amer
| lea. II 10 Illegal and ought to lee stepped
Charles Cassat Davis-The constitutional
guaranty Of personal liberty would hardly
permit the broad construction Of the words
without unnecessary delay" claimed by
the police department, it seems to me. The
phrase does not mean instant for the use
Of the word unnecessary" implies the pos
siblity Of some delay. A statute giving any
unlimited discretion to the officer in taking