The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-10-16
A NEW EIAL FOR F |! JLINEUX The POiyl Case to Be
 Hs.fd Again. MURDER OF MRS. ADAMS One of Most Famous Cases in
 History of Criminality. Defendant Accused of Having Sent Cyanide of Mercury to Harry
 Cornish in Bromo-seltzer

1 New York. Oct. 15.-The court of ap- peals has granted Roland B. Molineaux a new trial.
 i Justices Parker, Haight and Gary did not believe that the Barnett evidence should be kept entirely out of the case. Judges Werner. Bartlett. Vann and | O Brien concurred in the prevailing opin- | ion and for the expunging of the Barnett testimony. The court gave out a con | densed statement of the reasons for | granting the new trial.
 Molineux was convicted of the murder of Catherine J. Adams in New York City. and sentenced to death. The court grants d new trial on a prevailing opinion writ ten by Judge Werner of Rochester, this principal group being that the lower court erred in admitting evidence as to another alleged crime, the death of Bar nett and thus merged two issues.
 Courts Statement.
 'Evoy member of the Court of Ap- peais agrees for the reversal of the judg- ment of conviction of Molineaux on the ground that the trial court erred in re- 1 ceiving as evidence the declarations of | Barnett made to Drs. Phillips and Doug lass that he had received Kutnow pow ders through the mail.
 | "All agree that genuine writings may be received in evidence as standards of | comparison with disputed writing, al- though such writing may not be the issue on trial, but simply a fact relevant, and | material to that issue. The genuineness | of such writings must be established to | the satisfaction of the court by common | law evidence, and when that is done. l handwriting experts may compare the disputed writings with the genuine writ | ings, and give their opinion thereon, but | they cannot select and establish the standards of comparison and then com pare them with the disputed writings.
 'All writings proved to the satisfaction | of the court by a preponderance of evil | dence in civil cases and beyond a req | sonable doubt in criminal cases, CD by | witnesses who saw the paper written or to whom it had been acknowledged; @ | by witnesses familiar with the handwrit- | ing of the person charged to be the writer and who are able to testify from their familiarity to belief respecting it's genuineness; (3) where the writing is shown to have been recognized and &C., | quiesced in by the person supposed to | have written it. or adopted and acted | upon by him. in his business transactions or other concerns. may under the statute be compared with the disputed writing | by witnesses.
 But the court should refuse to receive 1 in evidence solely for the purpose of com parison any writing otherwise prejudcial to the defendant"
 Point of Difference.
 The only subject about which the mem bers of the court differ relates to testi- mony tending to show that Molineux caused the death of Barnett by the same method as that used in taking the life of Mrs. Adams. Four members of the court O'Brien. Bartlett, Yam and Werner agree that the evidence should not have been received and the reason for it is stated in the opinion written by OBrien and Werner.
 The other three judges, Parker, Gray and Haight, hold that that evidence is ad- msble in that the evidence in the Bar nett case pointing toward Molineux tends to identify him as the person who killed Mrs. Adams while attempting to take the life of Cornish by means of that rare poison, known as cyanide of mercury the chief judge and judge writing opin- ions to that effect.
 Regarding the admission of the testi- mony regarding the Barnett case the majority opinion says: If the case had been tried upon the theory that the only crime which the defendant had committed was the killing of Mrs. Adams in the at tempt to poison Cornish, the next and final step in the case of the prosecution would have been to prove the defen- dants connection with the handwriting of the address upon the poison package. But as a part of the theory or theories upon which the prosecution sought to con- meet the defendant with the killing of Mrs. Adams, evidence was offered and AI I-Fa Iav.N responsible for the previous killing of one Henry C. Barnett, who came to his death at the Knickerbocker Athletic Club House on the 10th day of November, 1898.
 General Rule of Evidence.
 ''The general rule of evidence applicable to criminal trials is that the State cannot prove against a defendant any crime not alleged in the indictment, either as a foundation for a separate punishment or as aiding the proofs that he is guilty of the crime charged.
 What was the motive assigned for the defendants alleged attempt to kill Cor nish? Hatred engendered by quarrels between tkem in which Barnett took no part, and of which, so far as the record shows he had no knowledge. What was the motive which is said to have moved the defendant to kill Barnett? Jealousy caused by the latLer's intervention in the
 
 statement of these two motives suffices to show that they had no relation to each other, and that the evidence which tends to prove the killing of Barnett throwns no light upon the motive which actuated the attempt upon the life of Cornish. So apparent. indeed, is this di- versity, of motive in the two cases, that the learned counsel for the people upon the argument herein, abandoned the claim that there was anything In common between them and ingeniously sought to create single motive ont of the alleg- ed forgeries by the defendant of the names of Barnett and Cornish. Of course, no differences can be drawn from these alleged foFgeries without assuming that tho Barnett and Cornish letters were all properly received in evidence and proven to have been written by the defendant We will therefore assume that all of these letters were properly Tn evidence, that they were written by the