Los Angeles herald., 1909-08-14
SUTTON INQUIRY
IS ATTENDED BY
LARGE AUDIENCE
SUMMING UP BY COUNSEL Is
ATTRACTIVE FEATURE
MOTHER OF DEAD LIEUTENANT
NOT PRESENT IN COURT
Court VIII Sit in Private to Discuss
Findings, Which When Reached
Will Be Sent to WASH
ington
TBy Associated Press. ]

A NNAPOLIS, Nd, Aug. 13.-The
Ia largest audience that has attended
- q session thus far was present to-
day. at the beginning of the last day Of
the open sessions of the court of inquiry
investigating the death on october 13,
1907, of Lieutenant James n. Sutton.
The attraction was the summing up
by Henry NJ Davis, counsel for Mrs.
Sutton, and A. e. Brney counsel for
Lieutenant Adams
Mr. Davis argument led the judge
advocate to speak briefly, and what
he said was not in the nature of argu-
ment touching the case.
Mrs. Sutton was not present at the
afternoon session. 1t was explained
privately she had been so affected by
the touching reference of Mr. Davis
to her lost son that she did not feel
able to appear.
Mrs. Rose Sutton Parker. her daugh-
ter, was present throughout the pro-
ceedings, however. The court will sat
tomorrow in private to discuss findings
which, when reached, will be for
Warded to the navy department at
Washington. whence the announce
ment of the result of the inquiry will
be made.
Mrs, Sutten said tonight if the find
ings of the court declared, as did those
of the former board that her son COM
mitted suicide, she would carry the
case still further.
The session of court investigating the
death of Lieut.. James N. Sutton, jr,
u. S. NJ. c., reached the concluding
stage today, when Henry E. Davis,
counsel for Mrs. Sutton, the mother of
Lieutenant Sutton. summed up his
case.
The announcement of the judge ad-
vocate that he would present no ar
gument, Mr. Davis said, placed on
him (Davis) a burden he had not
expected to be called on to bear.
He would review the testimony only in
the broadest manner, he said.
Mr.. Davis went back to the coming
of Lieutenant Sutton to Annapolis and
alluded to him as a mothers offering
to her country's service" He referred
to the lieutenant's hopes and aspira-
tions as shown by letters to his mother
and brother and to the events of the
day before the tragedy, arguing that
everything tended to negate the idea
that Lieutenant Sutton committed sui
eide. He criticised the composition OF
the original board of inquiry. of which
the recorder was Lieut.. Z. S. Willing
but for whose dereliction, Mr.. Davis
said, Lieutenant Sutton might still be
alive.
The board Of inquest he said, acted
with indecent haste, with no notice to
Lieutenant Sutton's family. placing on
him the brand of suicide, thus denying
him Christian burial according to the
family faith, and consigning him to an
unconsecrated grave; stripping his par
ents of hope of reunion with him
hereafter and condemning him, as
they were compelled to believe, to eter-
nal punishment.
Wishes Stigma Removed
Mr.. Davis alluded to the interviews
had by Suttons sister, Mrs, Rose SUIT
ton Parker, with her brothers fellow
officers, Lieutenant Utley's brutal as
sertion of hatred of Lieutenant Sut-
ton and to her plea to have Lieuten-
ant Adams help only to remove the
stigma of suicide from her brothers
name. He said the only recourse Of
the family was an inquiry such as the
one Just closed, and he outlined the
months of effort on the part of Sut-
toms mother and sister TO bring this
about
Mrs. Sutton's suspicion, he said, grew
with the delay Mr.. Davis said the
tragedy did not follow a drunken braWl,
that Sutton's alleged former escapades
shed no light on the case, and this and
other matters never should have been
brought into the case.
He sketched the events of the even
ing and night as shown by what he
declared were "uncOntroverted facts,
and criticised that part of the finding
of the first board Of inquiry