Los Angeles herald., 1908-01-31
VENGEANCE
OF LAW is
REMVOKED
LOGIC OF FACTS TAKES PLACE
OF FORMER SNEERS
SLAYING OF STANFORD WHITE is
AGAIN ANALYZED
Note of Fairness, Tinged with Mercy
Characterizes Prosecutors Ad-
dress to Men Who Now Hold
Fate of Millionaire
By Associated Press.

By Associated Press.
NEW YORK, Jan. 30-William
Travers Jerome, representative of the
people, made a masterly plea today
that justice be done in the case of
Harry Kendall Thaw.
Vindictiveness, sneers insinuations,
all were lacking; logic, analysis and a
calm consideration of the facts were
their substitutes
1t was no blind appeal for the
vengeance of the law that Mr.. Jerome
addressed to the jury, but ever and
always there was the note of fairness,
even at times of mercy.
The year that has elapsed since the
first trial had wrought a wonderful
and startling change in the prosecutor.
No longer attempting to shield the
name of Stanford White, he accepted
the story told by Evelyn Nesbt Thaw
as true-all but the drugging-and he
made frank confession to the jury that
the velvet swings and mirrored rooms
of the studio house described by the
girl were indeed a miserable reality.
No longer attacking Evelyn Thaw
as skilled adventures, Jerome plead
ed for the girl because she never had
had a chance for any of the higher,
cleaner, sweeter things of life.
The climax came however, when Mr.
Jerome denounced both White and
IIdW III Oll6 Ditdln anu tldSStu lllGtll
as two degenerates quarreling over
woman, and the woman, the prosecu-
tor declared, knew no more-had been
taught no more by the world-than to
play one against the other, until, in
Jealous rage in blindest hatred, in
vengeance of an undeniably gross
wrong done to his wife, Harry Thaw
shot and killed the architect.
Goes to Jury Today
The case will go to the jury tomor.
row morning, and Thaw may know
his fate before the setting of another
sun.
Justice Dowling will begin, his charge
as soon as court convenes at 10:30
o'clock. He postponed the reading of
his instructions until tomorrow in or
der that the jury might have all day
for consideration os the. evidence be-
fore being locked up in the stuffy lit
tie jury room.
District Attorney Jerome turned a
willing ear to the testimony of insanity
and emphasized 1t in a number of in
stances lie admitted that Thaw had
always been physically weak and that
at times his mind had been unstrung.
And, while at no point was there the
direct offer of compromise in the
prosecutors speech, there was notably
an indication that he would not feel
that justice had been misdirected If a
NtIQlCI Oh SOIlle lesser quit imam muir
der in the first degree should be the
elimination of the jury's deliberations.
Mr. Jerome carefully explained the
elements that enter into a verdict of
primary murder, the penalty of which
is death, and then he pointed the way
to two other findings, which he de-
clared were possible under the circum-
stances.
Degrees Defined
attorney said, the killing must have
heen the result of both intent and de-
liberation; in the second degree MUIR
der, he said, the intent to effect death
remained, but generalization must
have no part; in manslaughter in the
first degree, he declared, the elements
We're an overwhelming rage and fury,
which compelled the assailant to shoot
Without however, the intent to in
flict death.
Mr.. Jerome said he could not see
how, under their oaths as jurors, the
twelve men in the jury box could go
outside of these three Verdicts.
To repder a verdict of not guilty on
the ground OF insanity, the prosecutor
declared it would be necessary underC
he statutes and the decisions of the
court OF appeals, for the Jurors to be-
lieVe Harry ThaW was so insane that
IN his hand when he fired with perfect
and deadly atrn three bullets into the
Eody of his Vicim; that he must have
feen 50 insane as not to know the
man he killed was Stanford White,
the one man ir the world whom ne
hated and had a motive for vengeance
against; that he must have been so
insane as not to know that It. was
against she law to take fellow being
70. = I.a zut hoNra hppn insane
as not to know that the police ofn-
rers wanted with him when he volun-
.arily surrendered himself into their
custody AMI asked to be taken quickly
TO the station house, with the request
that his brother-in-law and an attor-
liey be sent fer, and lastly, that ne
must have been so insane as not TO
j'now tie nature or quality OF MS ACT
or that the act was wrong.
Lacking in these essentials. the IN
sanity of the defendant, conceded TO
have manifest al itself at certain times,
had no standing under the law. Far
tial or incipienl insanity, which does
not rob tn sufferer of perception
Of the acts he commits, has no recos-
milton under the law.
Mr.. Jerome fercely assaiIed the in
sanity experts of the defense, declar-
ing it was crying shame that "eX-
perts can be purchased to testify to
anything" This evidence, he declared,
served one purpose, and that was to
emphasize it's utter worthlessness. Not
one of the statements made by them,
ne declared, was worthy of credence.
Coming to the conclusion of his long
address. which lasted throughout the
morning and afternoon sessions of
court. Mr.. Jerome denounced Harry
,rhaw in bitterest terms as coward,
slxulking behind the petticoats Of his
WIFE, attempting to shield and save
his worthless life behind her sname.
prosecutor "he has sat in this court
room aud had her bare her shame, In
I'll its pItiful rake6ness, to the world.
Is such a man worthy of even the
slightest consideration at your hands?"