The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-08-22

arrested in the Jefferson shooting affair would In his opinion, have been bound over ts await the action of the grand jury had they been prosecuted on the prelirol nary hearing with the same zeal that the United Mine Workers follow, thair .casas against his deputies. Certainly, tho sharihf would not express such an opinion unless ne had the facts to support the assertion. and If he has such facts, has he done hIs duty if he has failed to furnish such ,roo, or the guilt of those parties to the solicit tor or the judge, or is he now trying to shift the responsibility of his own derelie- uon to the shoulders of some one else? As 10 those l6 cases, Judge Benners in- iorfns me that MT Hinds Peevy. who ia attorney Tor Sherif Higdon, came to his onlce and said to him that he wanted him to issue about loo warrants for parties guilty of or connected wifh the sboat,nv into the train at Jefferson, That he tJndse Renners) told Mir. Pee,,v to ,.a,,,u. 'he altidavits and warrants, have sora "e 'o make the necessary affidavits be- 'iih' ana that he would issue the wa iaii's' mat Mr Hinds Peevy pre- pared 10 Of those warrants and sent them to ms tJudge BennersD residence hv bis oilee oey, accompanied by a negro man to make affdavits to them. That ha Judge Benners) issued those 1s warrants ana the different parties charged tbareip were arrested That MT. peevv pave to nun tJudge Benners) the names of no vii. hesses' though he Gudge Benners1 1vrota nm two letters asking him to furnish him 'ne names and location of the different witnesses, which letters he failed to an s"er' and that he (Judge Benners, nnaIl, saw him in person and asked him for . list of the witnesses in those casas ana to stili Tailed to furnish them, and never sid uo so' mat those IS cases were set down TOT trlai and MT. Hinds Peevy was pres eht at that time and that he (Judge Ben hers) called upon him to know what he wanted to do with the cases. and ba (Peevy replied that he had nothing what ever to do with the prosecution of the de- fendants, but said he was defending one of them.
 No Witnesses Present. The cases were then dismissed because Shere were no witnesses present to testi- fM though Judge Benners had made three
 
 or the witnesses from MT. Peevy. l asked Judge Benners why he did not notify me- or one of my assistants, to come and prosecute those cases, as had
 been his custom to do in the past, and he l replied that the reason he did not do so
 was that he thought MT. Hinds Peevy was employed specially to prosecute and l that he thought he (Mr. Peevy) would mo- tify me when they came up for trial so | that I might prosecute the cases. l wish to say that MT. Peevy never no- tihed me that those cases were set for | trial, nor did Sheriff Higdon. If either of ! them had desired those 16 men prosecuted. would not the sheriff himself or his attor- ney MT. Peevy, have asked me to pros ecute them? They knew I stood ready to prosecute the cases mentioned above just as zealously as I prosecuted any other vio- l lation of law.
 Feeling that the assertions of Sheriff | Higdon in his published card may have put me in a false light before the public, l deem it my duty to myself and my friends to give out this statement l will prosecute, during these extraordi- | nary times, as I have always done in the past, fairly, impartially, and fearessly any one, regardless of who he may be. | who violates the law. H. P. HEFLIN, Solicitor.