The Montgomery advertiser., 1909-05-21
POPE WOMAN
 DENIES GUILT On Witness Stand In
 Clanton. CASE GOES TO JURY TODAY States Lawyers Argue for Extreme
 Penalty. They Hold That If Hattie Pope slew Her Aged hother, She should
 Bs Put To Death.
AsE GOES TO JURY TODAY
BY rARLEroN COLLIER.

lr 4 F 4
 Clanton. May -tSpecial. )--whep the State had completed the examina- ton of it's final witness on rebuttai in the Hattie Rope case one of the most singular trials of Alabama criminal an- nals neared It's end.
 Throughout tue two days in which testimony has been taken, little or none of it has been direct. Circumstantial entirely is the case against Mrs. Pope, Constructed of a powerfully convincing chain of incidents to prove that she Killed her mother, Mrs. Mary lane King.
 Early in the forenoon. the State had completed its direct testimony and the defense opened it's assault on the strong circumstantial chain by intro- ducing its witnesses. the last being ex- amined at 6 o'clock. The States rebut- tai was completed at ' o'clock and recess was taken for the supper hour, the arguments being opened lates.
 County Solicitor Adams opened for the State and Tipton Mullins for the defense. Both arguments were pro cesses of reason more than oratoricai efforts.
 Mrs. Pope on stand.
 Mrs Pope herself was the first wit ness for the defense in, the afternoon. for though Warren Woods. the alleged accomplice of theS<States contention. was first on the stand, the single ques- ton asked him was thwarted by the sustained objection of the State.
 Mrs Pope, wonderfully collected af- ter the two days of trial denied every allegation of the State. She did not kill her mother, she answered toSbegin. she denied having been near the newly dug grave in the rear of her house. the grave intended. it is supposed. by the murderer to hold the body of the mur- dered woman: she denied this in the face of more than one witness who had testified to having seen her there. She told that she slept near an open wiu- dow with her shoes discarded within a foot of the window. From this the in- ference was drawn by the defense that some one. the real murderer. had pil- fered the shoes with which to make tell tale tracks about the yard and grave. Ehe denied that ever had she confessed to the location of the bloody clothing as Hub Lucas. the deputy sheriff making the arrest. said she had. She disowned portions of the bloody garments iden- tified by States witnesses as having been worn by her on the day of the murder.
 Through 1t all. Mrs. Pope spoke with out tremor almost with noncha- lenca or indifferepca
 rMs. Pope declared that she had been threatened with lyncliinR on the night of the murder. a MT. Killingsworth, a neighbor of hers, telling Deputy Lucas that he might start to Shaw's with her but that she would never get thare.
 Mrs. Pope told of her last meeting with her mother, how she left the house early in the afternoon bound for Moore's place. She. declared that at the behest of her mother she had taken her baby. at the same time telling Mrs. King. that she did not like to leave her alone. Then. said Mrs Pope. when she returned, her mother was dead with her throat cut from ear to ear and weltering in pools of blood.
 Not one of the apparently conclusive circumstances related by the witneseec against her shook Mrs, Pope and she denied her guilt.
 The stand of, the defense Is one of denial against circumstantial case of the State.
 Verdict Expected Today.
 The case will go co the Jury to- morrow early and 1t Is thought that verdict will be reached within a short time. Though absolutely indetermin- ate is the outco@S. a conviction is ex- pected by the public a conviction which, in the light Of the unnatural crime. were one committed, will mean the limit life sentence or the other worse alternative.
 One of the contentious of the State Is that there is no middle ground. The prosecutors say that if she is found guilty the circumstances call for lim- it sentence.
 The case of the defense. as mapped out yesterday, is new, while that of the prosecution In the main had been gone over in the preliminary. Two of the witnesses for the defense were the