The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1903-05-20
ALL REVERSED.
Three st. Louis Doodle Cases
Have Been Passed Upon.

Jefferson City, Mo-, May 20.-In re-
versing the decision of the St. Louis
circuit court in the case of ex-Delegate
H. A Faulkner and ex-Delegate julius
Lehman, the Missouri supreme court
holds that the mere allegation that a
combine existed in the house of dele
gates of st. Louis to control the action
of that body on the Suburban bills is
not sufficient to warrant the assump
ton that Faulkner and Lehman were
members of that combine and knew of
the $4,000 which was deposited in the
Lincoln Trust company to secure the
passage of the bill. but that the state
must go further and prove that a COM
bine did actually exist and that 1t was
formed for the purpose of controlling
the action of the house of delegates on
the Suburban bill.
The court holds that the trial court
erred in permitting Paul Reiss to testify
to a conversation which he had with
Julius Lehman in May, 1901, regarding
the SIS, 900. On this point the opinion of
the supreme court follows:
AS defendant (Faulkner) had not in
volxed this hearsay, it was obviously IN
competent and highly prejudicial to al
low the state to introduce it on the
claim that Reiss was entitled to tell
from whom he had heard it. He had al
ready detailed at length all that the de-
PENDANT had told him, and beyond that
it was contrary to elementary prln-
cipleS and improper to permit him to
tell the jury what some one else had
told him in. the absence Of the defend
ant. The defendant could not be found
by what Lehman. in his absence and
without defendant (Faulkner) consent
ing thereto. had told Reiss six months
previously.
''Lehmann's statement, so far as
Faulkner was concerned, was pure hear
say and inadmiSsible, and in no way
binding on Faulkner. and the circuit
court erred IN admitting it over the pro
test Of Faulkner
AS to the claim made by the state
that this statement of Lehman to
Reiss was not a privileged communica-
ton, the court defines a privileged COM
mun1catlon and communication that
is not privileged as follows:
First-To be privileged a communi-
cation must pass between the client and
his attorney in professional confidence,
and in the legitimate course of profess
siona1 employment of the attorney.
'-Second-If the communications are
by the client made to the attorney be-
fore the commission of the crime and
for the purpose of being guided or help
ed in its commission, they are not priv
LEGGED"
Measured by this definition, the court
says that the communication from Len
mann to Reiss was privileged, because
the crime of bribery was complete. SO
far as the original agreement to pass
the SUBURBAN Dill IN consideration OF int
SIS 600 was concerned.
lehman knew and was bound to
know, and Reiss, the attorney, knew
that Lehmann's claim against stock of
the Suburban company was one which
no attorney could force in any court
No judicial tribunal would have listened
to such a proposition for an instant and
the attorney advancing it would have
deserved disbarment"
Of all the St. Louis Doodle cases that
have been tried only three have been
decided by the Missouri supreme court.
The first was the case against Emil
Meysenberg, a wealthy member of the
city council. In that case the result in
the supreme court was reversal Judge
Sherwood, who wrote the opinion, did
not stop with reversing the case but
took occasion to criticise in the strongest
possible language, the circuit attorney
of St Louis and the methods he used
in the trial of his cases. Judge Sher-
wood was preparing to leave the bench
at the time, Judge Fox having been
elected in his place, and his denuncia-
ton of Folk was considered, by those
who believe with Judge H S Priest.
that bribery is only conventional
crime, one of the masterpieces Of his
thirty years work on the bench. but it
did not stop the prosecutions, nor the
investigation of Doodle in St Louis;
neither will these decisions stop the in
vestigation of the state Doodle cases.