The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-02-06
DEPENDANT LAUGHED
 AT THEIR PREDICAMENT
Effort to Prove Streak of Insanity
 in Family.
Little Progress Was Made By The De- sense Ia Proving slayer of stan- ford white was Mentally Ussalanced at Time
 of Crime.

New York, Feb. 5--The task of prov ing to jury that Harry Thaw was in- sane--through heredity and mental stress--when he shot and killed stan ford White, was taken up today by the defense in this famous case, and when adjournment was announced later in the afternoon. it was the general opin- ion in the court room that but little progress had been made.
 Thaw's attorneys endeavored in vain to place before the jury evidence tend ing, it was said, to prove a strain of insanity In the collateral branches of the defendants family. but they were blocked at every point by District At- torney Jerome. whose objections were upheld by the ruling justice. Fitzgerald
 The defense managed, however. to get before the twelve men in the box. the testimony of an expert that in his opinion Harry Thaw was suffering from insanity the night of the trag- edy. Mir. Jerome undertook to break down the evidence of the alienist--Dr. c. c. Wiley of Pittsburg--and for three hours put him through a cross examination as severe as any ever heard in New York court.
 The prosecution was relentless in its attack, and before he had finished. Dr.. Wiley protestingiy declared: T did not come here as an expert; l came as 8 witness to . fact and l have been con. verted into an expert without being prepared for t."
 The District Attorney astonished ev- sry one by his intimate knowledge of medicine and It's technical pnraseology. demonstrating the care with which he had prepared himself to meet the very defense which Thaw's counscl have en- tered In his behalf. Mir. Jerome search. In nerlxy f,SfA nN xssa as physician and as an expert on in- sanity.
 witness Was Helpless.
 He hurled voIleys of technical ques- tions at the witness, who at times war mute and at other times declared he nould not answer or gave eYasive re. plies. Often he brought upon himself J sharp warning from the District Attor- ney % make reply and not an argu- ment.
 Dl. Wiley tsstined that he predicat- ed his. opinion as to Thaw's insanity upon his actions the night of the trag- edy, as described to him in a hypo- thetical question propounded by the defense and upon an incident which he witnessed on Pittsburg street car during the summer of 1905. Thaw. said the doctor, acted irrationally on the car.
 Have you ever examined this de- fendant with any' of the recognized tests of insanityT asked Mir. Jerome.
 ''No," replied the witness.
 Have you ever conyersed with him?'
 No"
 The District Attorney then drew from the alienist the opinion that Thaw's acts on the Madison Square roof gar den when he killed Stanford White were not acts of insanity when taken nl n fy hui nf n- sanity when considered collectively.
 At times Dr. Wiley seemed entirely baffied by the questions He hesitated at each and before he could answer MT. Jerome had formed another re- rlete with impressive sounding tech nical terms and apparently offering a problem. no less difficult than its pre- decessor The witness admitted that many of the tests to which the Dis trict Attorney referred such as the Romberg test and the ArgyTl Robert son pupil test were unknown to him and when he was asked to quote from any accepted work on insanity, declared he could not give the exact language from any book.
 Jeromess Fund of Knowledge.
 Mr. Jerome's knowledge. however. seemed never to run dry. He carried his cross-examination through practi- eally the entire morning session and for an hour and twenty minutes after luncheon continued to ply the witness with all manner of questions. It was necessary for the bailiffs several times to rap down the outbreaks of laugh ter.
 Thaw's counsel sat silent and with out protest as MT. Jerome drilled the first witness for the defence. Thaw himself seemed to take bu- little in- terest in the cross-examination at the Iaka fn fal lkA and was often in earnest conversation with those of his counsel who sat near est him.
 Al times Thaw could not altogether suppress the suggestion of a grin, at the keenness of some of Mfr. Jerome's questions and the subtle humor they so thinly concealed. But before the W He bit his finger nails and seemed anxious for the doctors ordeal to end JJis attorneys appeared a bit puzzled at tbis. but evidently determined to give the District Attorney the widest liberty.
 If was at the close of Mir. Jerome's cross examination of Dr. Wiley that the attempt was made to introduce testimony tending to show the strain of insanity said to have existed in cer- tain branches of the Thaw family. Among the witnesses called was Albert Lee Thaw of Richmond Va, who said that his father and Harry Thaw's fath- CT were first cousins. The defense stated it's purpose to draw from the 1yitness the fact that his father died ,n an asylum for the insane when Mir.
 Relationship Too Far Removed
 He declared that the relationship of hoth the witness and his father Was too far removed from the defen- Tant to be competent. And the law be added, "is not satisfied that man ,s ;nsane merely because he dies in ar asylum or a retreat for persons suffering from mental disorder The fact that a man dies in an insane asy- ium such as that conducted by pr. wiley. the eminent specialist we had mon the stand today, for instance. Is no proof that he was Insane. There must be competent testimony to the fact" .a 4ka naaffaF aaving. how ever, that