Arizona republican., 1905-04-15
HEARING
Proceedings in the Inter-
 national Case Begin
WOLZ'S WONDERFUL TALE
His Many Meetings With the Defend- ant in a Period of Eight YearS-The Defense Is Provided With a Long Array of Witnesses.

The hearing of the application of the i British government for the eXtradition of 'W. A. Hobbs, commonly known as , Lee Hobbs" for the murder of a Brit ish subject on a British vessel on the | high seas on September ?, 1902, was begun before Judge Kent yesterday | afternoon. It was continued until five | o'clock when an adjournment was talk | en until half past nine o'clock this | morning. Though the heart of the l case has not yet been approached suf- | ficient progress has been made to dis l close that it is the most interesting l matter that has ever come up in this part of the country. If it should turn ! out that the Hobbs in custody is. the i man wanted it will again be proved that truth is stranger than fiction. The most imaginative man could not have devised stranger situations than many in which the participants in this case are alleged to have been placed.
 The hearing had been set for half past nine o'clock in the morning but at that hour several witnesses for Hobbs from Graham county had not come and word was brought to the 
 afternoon. They were not, however,
 immediately needed, for it was evident that the case of the British govern ment would occupy perhaps two days. { The defendant appeared in court ac-
 companied by his attorneys, Judge Mcfarland Of SOlOmOnville and Street
 & Alexander of this city. There ap-
 peared for the British government.
 Consul General COurtenay Walter Ben
 nett of San Francisco, Attorney T. F.
 K. Carmac of San Francisco, Judge
 Baker and L. H. Chalmers of Phoe-
 nix.
 The proceeding was such an unusual one in the courts of this territory that
 the attorneys were not quite sure how
 they should proceed. A plan having
 been agreed upon, MT. Carmac intro
 duced several documents prepared by
 the British government or at the of
 fee of the consul general of that
 government in San Francisco. Among
 them was what in this country would
 be called the commission of the consul
 general, formidable document signed
 by the king and bearing in one cor
 ner over the great seal a square of
 black bordered paper. In explanation of this unusual decoration it was pointed out that the date of the doc
 ument was within one year after the
 death of Victoria and that the period
 of the nations mourning had not end
 ed Following the introduction of this
 paper there came the exequatur of the
 president of the United States ac-
 knowIedging MT. Bennett as the rep resentative of his government.
 All these papers and others estab- , fishing the position of the applicant having been considered as having been entered, the consul general was called
 to the stand. He made an opening statement in which he said that he had no personal feeling in this matter. It
 was not his wish that the defendant, if an innocent man, should be punish
 ed. Nor was it the wish of the gov
 ernment he represented but that gov
 ernment would spare no pains to bring to justice the perpetrator of the crime with which the defendant stood charg-
 ed.
 MT. Bennett proved himself to be a remarkable witness and remarkably
 we'll acquainted with the affairs of his office What he did not have i'm < mediately in his mind he had at his
 fingers ends. In the course of his . testimony another paper was brought
 in. That occasioned some discussion
 and questioning. It was a certified
 copy of the list of sailors who had
 shipped at San Francisco on July 25
 on the schooner rigged Liecester Cas- l tie. The original document, made up 1 from the report of the shipping mas
 ter was in the office of the consul ) general. It showed among other things : that one w A. Hobbs had signed as
 an A. B. and was to receive $25 a e month. That MT. Bennett said was
 the highest amount paid able bodied
 seamen out of that port. Here the
 attorneys for the defendant thought
 they saw an opening. It is conceded : that the defendant could not have had . sufficient experience at that time to have qualified for what is commonly H regarded as an A. B. The witness was asked if the fact that w A. Hobbs & was to receive such wages did not in : dicate to the mind of the witness that
 he must have been an experienced sea- H man. The witness replied that it in- d dicated nothing of the kind; that many H a man signed as an A. B. who haC A had no experience at all. That was 8 n fact always found out later. An A. B < is supposed he said, to have d certif- # cate from his last ship of his qUalifca- 7 tions but frequently these papers are Fl lost; beside in San Francisco able 5 bodied sailors are hard to obtain anC Fl persons not qualified are often shipped d A little further along a time con- T suming incident came up. MT. CarmaC a introduced a bundle of deposition: a taken from persons in various parts q of the world. The attorneys for tho S defense objected to the reading O. E them until they had had time to lool q over them to ascertain if they were O
 proper form and contained proper a matter It was finally decided tha T they should be read in chambers wher :. some conclusion regarding their dispo-
 sition should be made. Therefore the
 contents of the dispositions are no Continued on Page 4.