The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1899-02-02
lRoNED AND IN A DUNGEON.
EN- JUDGE RANDOPH'S CRUEL
TREATMENT IN COLOMBIA.

Kept in Irons for Nine Months and
in Such "a Position That sleep Was
Most DinicuIt-An Assault on the
American COnsuI-RandoI Sem
fenced for Murder without Fair
TriaI-Was an Absconder From
Alabama.
Montgomery, Ala. Feb. 1.-The Adver-
tiser has received a four-column address [
from ex-Judge Frank Randolph, formerly /
of this place, who has been confined in |
prison in Medellin, Colombia, for over
three years The address is to Congress /
and the people of the United States.
Judge Randolph was a defaulter in the |
office of probate judge of this county, and |
fed from justice going from here to Mex
leo. He then went to South America and !
invested in a plantation in Colombia |
There he had some trouble with the former
owner of the place. and in a difficulty
killed him, and it is for this act that he is
in prison. What follows IS portion of his
statement:
4 am in prison since Sept. s. 1895. I'm
mediately upon being imprisoned I was
lltOtlIIullCdlctl that ASi Nut OlA AiNiAA Ga
communication with a human being for
three morths; denied privileges Of counsel
for the same period and all of my proper
ty of every description that the authori-
ties could find was seized and sequestered
by order of the government of Colombia.
In addition 1 was put in IRONS as heavy as
fifty pounds and so arranged that could
neither stand UP, sit or lie down without
great pain Sleep was impossible, save
by most painful snatches. I remained
thus ironed nine months.
Says Testimony Was False.
During the thee months in which !
was imcommunicated and denied counsel
all the witnesses Of the prosecution, some
forty or fifty, were examined in secret,
la inquisition, without my having the
opportunity by myself or counsel, then nor
since, to ask a single question of those
witnesses. 1t was upon the testimony then
and there SO taken that I was afterward
tried. Not one-tenth part of said wit
nesses could read or write. 1 have been
able TO prove the classification of the testi-
mOny N two of the cases of the most inl-
portant states Witnesses and the falsih-
cation of my own testimony al down by
arfler ne the. 5aasp- +e-I-inr said testimony.
about May IA, 1896, IerC CaHrornia
for Medellin under a guard Of regular
| soldiers, consisting of lieutenant and
twenty-four men. The lieutenant had or
| ders to put me in heavy irons and in a
dungeon every night during the trip. To
this end the journey was so arranged that
each night we stopped in a town where
there was dungeon, and was forced on
the trip to carry on my own mule, fur
nished at my cost. these cruel irons fer
my own punishment.
Nine Months in Irons.
"I had been for nine months heavily
ironed day and night and confined in
dark and damp prison, part of the time
in a dungeon without an air hole. even
and was in no condition to stand four
hundred mile ride in tropical climate.
Such was my condition that the third
days journey from Gall the lieutenant of
my guard, Anibal Bernal not wishing TO
have me die on his hands, threw away
the irons and let me rest without them
at night But at the end Of a two days
journey when we reached Medellin
knees, We're so eaten into and corroded
by the irons that they were almost solid
mass of putrid boils and assesses TO such
degree, that for two months l could not
walk.
Il reached Medeflin June 2. 1896. In No
vember 1896, jury of three men was se-
lected to try me, and were du4y empanelled.
few days afterwards, without the reason
assigned this jury was DISCHARGED and
my triai indefinitely postponed. On July
!, 1897, after being nearly two years in
prison. enduring most of that time treat
ment more cruelty brutal than they accord
TO their convicts ! went through the farce
Of a trial for murder and was convicted of
murder, and chiefly upon the evidence of
Chicago newspaper articles read to the
jury by the prosecutor. without any pre- |
tense Of proof, and which articles formed
the burden of his two speeches to the jury. |
American Consul Assaulted.
The presiding judge of the tribunal |
trying my case, and the fiscal (prosecut- |
ing attorney of that tribunal armed and |
without proVocation assaulted and de- |
nounced the American consul in Medel- |
lin, Mr.. Thomas Herran, the son of a |
former president, the grandson Of an |
other former President aud the grand !
nephew of still another president being |
the grand nephew of two arch bishops of |
Colombia, and gave at the time of said |
assault the reason that Herran was a |
traitor to his country because he was the |
Yankee consul and was the friend and |
protector and accomplice of a Yankee |
assassin
THESE facts were sworn to by all the |
witnesses to the affair and sent to the |
government at Bogota. The result was
that Senor Caro- was so pleased with the |
conduct Of his officials that he rewarded |
both by appointing the fiscal a judge OF |
the highest tribunal in the state, and by |
In, Ia
governor Of the state of Antoquia. These
facts were officially reported 10 the gov
ernment by the United States consul at
Medellin and by myself.
Bad Treatment of Americans.
'I have written the above without any
reference to my guilt or innocence of the
crime murder, of which am charged.
have written simply 90 show what treat
ment American citizens can receive in Co
lombia, and what care United States min
isters and the government Of the United
States itself takes OF its citizens abroad