The San Francisco call., 1909-08-13
PRISONERS WIFE IS
SCORED BY COURT
Characterizes Evelyn Thaw's
Story of Tower Room as
Wildly Improbable
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of Susan Merrill regarding Thaw's al
legged perverted practices, and points
out the contrast between Thaw's chiv-
alrous attitude as a protector of young
American womanhood and his private
life
Justice Mills expressed deep SYM
pathy for the prisoners mother and her
exposition of the horrors of Mattea-
wan" on the stand evidently prompted
his recommendation that Thaw be al
lowed greater privileges at that insti-
tuition.
Not the least significant sentence in
Justice Mills decision, in the opinion
OF lawyers here, is one which declares
that Thaw's "delusions had become
fixed and established prior TO the time
of his marriage" 1t is pointed out that
this sentence may prove ground for
proceedings by Mrs. Evelyn Thaw for
divorce.
After discussing the evidence Justice
Mills draws the following conclusion:
FIRST CONCLUSION
The insanity with which Harry X.
Thaw was afflicted on June %. 1906,
was the kind known as chronic de-
fusion insanity or paranoia. This con-
clusion rests upon the following facts,
which appear TO me to be clearly
proven:
There was, in his ancestral stock,
substantial but not very strong
trace of insanity. BY not very strong
is meant the fact that no one of his
direct ancestors was ever insane. On
the maternal side two uncles were of
unsound mind, each at least for a por-
tion of his life; and on his fathers
side an aunt was at least an epileptic
and perhaps insane; and some more re-
mote relatives were undoubtedly insane,
though as to them the evidence is not
clear, but there had been insanity in
one of their ancestral lines not common
TO the prisoners own descent.
AS young child he was physically
weak and puny, exceedingly nervous
and abnormally willful. Older. he was
subject to violent spells amounting al
most 10 paroxysms of excitement with
out any naturally adequate cause He
attended various schools for different
made little progress in study. While at
school. especially in his early years,
he had frequent outbreaks of uncon-
troiiable excitement in which his facial
appearance was wild and staring.
Continuing his history of Thaw's life,
Justice Mills says:
About 1901 he became enamored of a
young woman, Miss Nesbit, whom he
afterward married. She was then, by
common reputation, well known to
him, the mistress, or a mistress of
Stanford White. She soon assumed that
relation to Thaw and obviously to
account to him for her former position
with White, told him various wild and
grossly improbable stories of the incep
ton or that relation. Although he
0IhaW) evidently was himself far from
moral man, and was then engaged,
or soon thereafter became engaged, in
~, I'll. go
revealed by the testimony of the Mer-
rill woman, which, with the corrobora-
tion afforded by other evidence in the
case appears credible, he gave abso-
lutte credence to the tales told him by
Miss Nesbit about White He obtained
similar information as to Whites con-
directly from them or through Miss
Nesbit all OF which information was of
the same wild and improbable charac-
Ter, evidently. TO any normal mind,
To all. however, he gave implicit be-
llef. HIS mind became absolutely pos
sessed with the stories. He not only
believed them in their entirety, but he
deducted from them conclusions as to
the practices of White far beyond what
such belief in a normal mind would
warrant. From the charges separately
made by these few admittedly immoral
women he concluded that White main
tanned several places in New York city
where he accomplished, by force or by
American girls, as it were, by the
wholesale. Such belief to such an
extreme extent was plainly a delusion.
His delusions as TO the practices of
White were not shaken by the failure
OF the Investigations made by the de-
tectives and public authorities, and his
delusiye belief in his special mission
continued to possess his mind. In that
mental condition, at the roof garden
he came into the presence of White,
doubtless unexpectedly, and publicly
shot him to death in spectacular
and theatrical manner. In so doing
he believed he was acting as the agent
of providence and performing praise
Ing Goliath, or st. George in killing
the dragon.
Regarding Thaw's suspicion of a
conspiracy against him by his early
counsel, the court says:
Such belief-that is, to the purpose
was utterly without foundation and
clear delusion.
All this, according to the weight of
expert testimony, is plainly the history
therefore. that Thaw's insanity at the
commission of the homicide was of the
kind known as paronoia, and not at all
of the brain storm'-Sane half min
ute before and sane half minute after
variety, IL any such variety really
exists.
The verdict of the jury was plainly
warranted by the evidence. not merely
as an expression of reasonab BILE doubt.
but even as an Affirmative finding of
| the fact of insanity.
IL is true that the new testimony
upon this trial introduced in behalf of
the prisoner tends materially to vary.
the history Of his early life as above
in such variety it is very largely mis-