The daily morning Alaskan., 1904-01-08
sKAswAY NEEDS ATTENTION OF PROSECUTING ATTORNEY.

10 seems strange that even in Alaska ,ne of the most important towns in a judicial district should be left withou, the pale of influence of the public pros eeutor. There is a deputy district at- toruey at Ketchikan; a corps of pros eoutors at Juneau, but nobody at Skag- way to represent the government in the prosecution Of criminals or the prosecution of government cases before the commissioner. Skagway has population of nearly l5Oo; 1t is the port of entry to the Yukon and the chief tarrying place of the floating population of the southeastern coast and the interior. It is a border town constantly exposed to the depredauons Of all manner of grafters, fakirs and nor. dangerous criminals. With att torneys handy for defense and none Col prosecute. it is an easy matter for evil dosrs to become released from 'r-est on mere tecbnicalities and escape across the border. None but poor and friendless criminals need fear punish ment for any crime they may commit in Skagvay. The mill of justice at Skagway must alone grind upon brok- en-down buns, the penniless and Iu- dians-a rare that by presumption to Alaskan law is guilty per SC, and to an extent for extreme penalty, unless it be for murder confessed. The prisoners who have been turned loose dnrug the past quarter are presumably guiltless, and there is, perhaps, no reason to be- lieve that any of the government cases that have been lost during that period would have been gained had they been defended
 It was a humiliating sight lately to see an aged miner, ignorant of the law and without the merest knowledge of the rules of evidence and the customs of courts. bearing the onus of prosecu- tion in a government case of wespass in which he was the complaining wit- ness. !, was still more bizarre, yester- day, to see the prosecution of a selling whisky-to-Iudians case divided up be- tween six jurymen and the commission CT after the fashion of a French revolu- tionary trial as described by Carlyle And at this very trial the prisoner iu- formed the jury how constantly and within his knowledge the crime of sell ing whisky to Indians was practced at Skagway. The very effective corps of the United States marshal at Ssagway is not composed Of lawyers. I, is not supposed to be. Itis hardly consistent for the commissioner to pre-study gov ernment testimony in eases that are to. be brought before him. The defense less condition of the public of Skag- way in this respect may shed some lus- tre, perhaps, on the prosecuting attor- ney's office, in that none held for trial in the district court could possibly es-. cape conviction, unless they were very poorly defended The volume Of pure ly federal business in the commission CTS court would seem worthy of the a,- tention of the district attorney and that 1t has not been is universally de- plored, not only by the residents of the town (who are, perhaps, not a sufficient factor to warrant much considerationh but by every federal official in Skag- way, and especially the commissioner and the employees in the marshai's office.
 Perhaps the attention of the prose cutting attorney has not been called to' these conditions, and it is upon that presumption that the statement isl made