The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1900-03-14
EXHIBIT "a"
Queer Things Which Find Their
Way Into Courts.
George Sharitt Has Plumber
Unlimited in His Charge.
JUNK SHOP MATERIAL.
Murderers' instruments and
Fruits of Patent Right Suits.
Bottle of Brandy the Latest to
Be "Filed."
JUNK SHOP MATERIAL.

All sorts of peculiar things find their
way into the United States courts as
Exhibit a, or some other alphabetical
designation, and George F. Sharitt,
clerk of the circuit court, is thinking of
starting junk shop with the aecumu-
lations of the years that he has been
connected with the office.
He has samples of different kinds of
soap, sections of barb wire and other
kinds of fences, cash carriers such as
are used in department stores, water
pipes, fruit evaporators, telephone in
struments, and various other contriv-
ances over which there have been
patent right suits.
There are instruments with which
murders have been committed: meat
saw which was used in a murder at
Leavenworth years ago, and the ball
bat with which Joseph Leach killed
Sergeant Fennell at Fort Riley in 1897
Then there is the little old leather
trunk which was the property of John
Hillmon at the time he is alleged to
have been killed, and which has been
shipped around to the various trials of
the Hillmon case during the past 20
years, but which the attorneys on both
sides of the famous case have carefully
avoided opening during all that time
for fear they might find out something
they did not wish to know.
But a new style of Exhibit A. has
just been filed with Mr.. Sharitt. It is
a. long dark bottle filled with an amber
cOlored liquid, and bears the label of
an old French liquor. It is to be used
as evidence in a suit for infringement of
a trademark brought by French cog
nae and brandy manufacturing firm
against some AtchisOn druggists.
This firm has been making cognac
and brandy for a generation or two,
and their trade mark is known the
world over. They discovered that some
one was putting out spurious goods un-
der their labels and trade mark and
they have printed forms of complaints
for fling actions in the federal courts.
They claim to have discovered that
Kaffer & kessler, an Atchison drug
firm, was selling the spurious article,
! whether knowingly or not is not stated,
and they sent d detective to AtchisOn to
/ buy some of it. The detective was Sam
! 3. Strothers, and his deposition in the
| case is filed, in which he says he pur-
| chased the bottle of spurious cOgnac of
| Kaffer & kessler in March, 1898, and
/ that he knows it is spurious because it
! has not the private mark of the firm
/ although to most people a bottle of the
! real and spurious would probably APP
/ pear the same.
This is the bottle which is fled as
| Exhibit A. in the case. 1t is duly
/ marked by the notary before whom it
was identified in the deposition
When it is desired to open sealed de-
! positions in any case, some one con-
/ nected with the case moves that the
! dispositions be published" This is
| simply another term for opened. Mr..
/ Sharitt says he expects that the first
time the lawyers get together some of
! them will move that Exhibit AZ be
/ Immediately published" and the mo-
ton will meet with little resistance
The French firm is asking for an in
junction to stop the sale of the spurious
article under their trade mark, and for
| judgments for all the profits which
have accrued from the sale of the spur
/ iOuS goods.