Norwich bulletin., 1909-08-11
.ThaIW's Review
 Of Evidence
IN REGENT HEARING FOR RE-
 LEASE FROM WATERMAN.
20 ALIENIsTs AFFIRM HIS SANITY
Says Attorney Jerome in His Long Examination Had Proved Him Sane "Forty-five Times Over"

White Plains, N. Y, Aug. 10.-Harry K. Thaw today issued statement re- viewing the evidence given in his re- cent hearing on his application for re- lease from the Matteawan asylum. In the course of his argument to sustain his contention that he is sane, Thaw said that, according to the alienists, District Attorney Jerome had proved him to be sane 'forty-five times over in his long questioning. Thaws' state ment follows:
 The following is all I have to say about the trial:
 "Mr. Jerome's witnesses were an unprofessional lawyer and an unfor- tunate woman who contradicted each other also three of his peculiar alien ists and Dr. Baker, who, from his tes- timony, might have been on either side except that he showed some unfriend- liness to us, and could not remember many admissions he had made to me and to Dr. Pilgrim.
 'Dr. Baker admitted he did not be- lieve in souls because he had never seen any. pr. Hirsch affirmed that their profession was incompatible with religion. Dr. Macdonald and Dr. Flint refused to believe what Jerome had solemnly stated to jury, so I hardly think any judge could believe any of them.
 Says Jerome Proved His Sanity.
 ''The best experts have informed me that if any insane man was ques- toned for twenty minutes as Jerome questioned me he would assuredly show his insanity. As Jerome kept this up over fifteen hours in all dur ing the triaLshe proved me sane forty five times over for the alienists said any twenty minutes during his fifteen hours of wild and extraordinary ques- tions would have settled any paranoi- ac.
 However, I might have failed, as other sane men might have, so I do not consider my testimony one-tenth so important as the twenty alienists who personally examined me and in the records have sworn I am sane or the testimony of the sixty-two lay witnesses.
 MT. Jerome at the second trial, aft CT telling the jury why he had not produced Dr. Flint and company. said he would submit the case to human intelligence.
 William De Morgan relates the fol- lowing conversation to the same point:
 "A great alienist is going to operate on woman who has been unconscious for forty years and desires clear knowledge of her mental state if she regainS any mental faculties. So he asks his wife and her friends to watch. The. doctor tells them. I don't want you to see anything of the operation, but what want is to have one or more good observers at hand and I want everything observed and rec ollected.' His wife replies, Why won't the people at the asylum do?
 "sBecause,' answered her husband, each of them has a theory and none of them will recollect anything that doesn't agree with it. I want real, live, human creatures of good average intelligence
 Claims Everyone Finds Him Rational.
 Tt seems to me I must be perfectly sane if hard-headed sensible men who slept in the same room with me, saw me undress and go to sleep and wake up. then eat my breakfast. dinner and supper, and who took me up on the mountains where I could have left them miles behind had I not been trustworthy, say so. These and many clergymen. headed by President Patton of Princeton. and ladies, some of whom have known me all my life, and bankers and manufacturers, and po- lice under prison keepers, accustomed to observing both sane and the insane men. also city clerks, editors. farmers, lawyers and the ex-governor of a great state, all find me perfectly sane and none find anything irrational at all
 This seems to prove my sanity ten times better than whether or no I could handle Mir. Jerome in a fourteen and a half hours debate on every pos sible subject except the alleged delus- ions which he did not seem to want explained Maybe explanations would have spoiled his hypothetical question.
 (Signed)
 CIT r. ,;,IJA NY