The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1910-04-01
FINDS HER SANE.
Lunacy Body Reports Mary Voll-
stedt of Sound Mind.
Assailant of Street Car Man to
Face Jury This Term.
SHE is A STUDY TO HIM
DIR. L. Ii. Powell Thinks Woman
Should Not Be Imprisoned.
Law Prevents Doctors From
Finding Her Insane.
SHE is A STUDY TO HIM

Mrs. Mary Q. Vollstedt, assailant of
| Conductor L. H. Daniels was found
not insane by a lunacy commission
today and will be tried as a criminal
during the April term of the district
court, which begins Monday.
1t was the opinion of the doctors
| that neither the asylum nor the pen
itentiary was a suitable place for the
patient. Compelled to act under the
statute defining insane" however.
the commission was forced to find her
sane.
| Drs. L. M. Powell and S. A. John
son, as witnesses, branded the Kan
sas definition of insanity as weak
and lame regretting also that the state
provides no fit place of detention for
patients of this Glass;
detention for year in some suit
| able place, and following that new
trial for sanity giving ample time to
determine whether or no the court
sham, was prescribed by both physf-
clans as the proper procedure in the
case.
Both medical men concurred, in re-
| ply to questions, in their opinion that
| the woman would not be able within
the brief period of thirty days to con-
| duct defence in a criminal action or
to suggest to her attorneys evidence
| to be obtained. or to intelligently tes-
| tify herself
DR.. Powell, whose opinion and tes-
timony has been awaited because he
| had performed a delicate operation
upon the woman, gave his opinion to-
| day that she is now insane. He had
thought her peculiar during a years
attention to her but without the act
OF shooting Daniels and the circum-
stances thereof showing the effect of
such personalities, he would not have
| judged her insane.
A Study to Him.
''She was a study to me- he said.
''She would talk quite 'intelligently
about most topics. But there was
gested a woman of no RESPONSE bility.
She seemed not to appreciate that she
was wife and the head of a home,
I noticed.
THE shooting was neither the act
of criminal non of an insane person
simply evidence of a weak mind,
The act of an undeveloped child. 1t
occurs to me as strange that she
should show an Indifference to the
crime after her Incarceration
DR.. S. A. Johnson, appointed exam
lining physician by Judge Schoch, tes-
titled for the commissioners and the
judge what his findings and opinions
were.
zone witness testifies of severe
sickness" he said. but that would
hardly be sufficient to cause insanity.
no harm from that. My opinion is
that under the statute there the wo-
man can not be called insane. I be-
lieve she is capable of any act at any
cuse for it. I think she knows right
from wrong and is responsible for her
conduct, but under impulse would not
consider right and wrong.
"She has a childs mind, but under
the law think she ought to go to the
nanifanfiarV. OniniOn that
it is unfortunate the state has not pro-
vided for this class of social menace.
There ought to be place of deten-
ton for them different from those for
criminals and lunatics."
What the Law Says.
The statute of the state of Kansas
defining insane" and under which
commissions in 1unacy have labored
in such cases as those of Mary Voll-
stedt, Fred Tanning, and other weak
minded persons, and to which ply
sicians refer as lame and weak, fol-
lows:
General statutes 1905, Section 1888.
The word insane" in this act shall
be construed to mean any person
whose mind, by reason of brain sick
ness, has become unsound, rendering
such person incapable of managing
or caring for his own estate or rem
dering him dangerous to himself or
others, or who is in such condition of
mind or body as to be fit subject for
care and treatment in hospital for
brain disease or insanity.
No person idiotic from birth, or
whose mental development was ar
rested by disease or physical injury
prior to the age of puberty, and no
person who is afflicted with simple
epilepsy shall be regarded as insane.
unless the manifestations of abnormal
excitability violence or homicfdal or
suicidal impulses are such as to rem
der such restrictions could not find
the afflicted, as herein provided, a
proper precaution to prevent him
from injuring others or himself.
The 1unacy commission which un-
der such restrictions could not find
Mrs. Vollstedt insane, was composed
of DR.. o. P. Davis and DR.. L. A. Ry-
der.