Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1913-08-21
Jury Reaches Verdict in
White Slave Case After
Five Hours.
SENTENCE NEXT MONTH
instructions of the Court Leave
Little Room for Doubt as
to Findings.

San Francisco, Cal, Aug. 21.-Maury
Diggs, convicted and awaiting SEN
tence for having violated the Mann
white slave traffic act in transporting
Marsha Warrington from Sacramento
to Reno for immoral purposes, was re-
leased at midnight in $4,000 bail. He
will be sentenced Sept. 2. Five years
is the maximum. Diggs was visibly
shaken by the jury's verdict, returned
at II o'clock last night. The jury was
out five hours.
The government today turned its at
tention to Drew Caminetti, Diggs' COM
panion, indicted for the same offense.
There was no attempt by the de-
tense in its closing arguments to prove
that Diggs did not transport Marsh
Warrington, across the state line from
Sacramento, Cal, to Reno, New.
1t was claimed, however, that his
act did not constitute a violation of
the Mann white slave traffic act be-
cause it had not been done with Grim
inal intent.
JUDGES INSTRUCTIONS PLAIN.
In his instructions to the jury the
judge declared it made no difference
whether the defendant was partl.- ac-
tuated by fear of exposure in deciding
to go to Reno. Their only decision
was to be whether immortality was
part cause for the trip.
After a conference with counsel in
the afternoon Judge Van Fleet asked
Juror William S. Bliss, a mining man,
liiff"nay body had approached him about
the case. Bliss said he had talked
with Mrs. c. B. Lane, at whose house
the Caminetti family has been staying
during the progress of the trial.
Diggs' counsel in summing up the
evidence did not palli,te his clients
acts.
Paint this defendant as you will
a monster if you please" Robert Dew
lin, his senior attorney, argued, but
tell me what motive he would have
had in going out of the state for the
purpose of accomplishing those things
already accomplished. Counsel may
characterize him as they please, and l
may not differ with them. They say
his act was shameless and l may feel
tEe same way about it, but it isn't
white slavery and you cannot convict
this man of crime he has not .om-
mitted, on his general conduct"
| This was the whole argumentative
| substance of the defense. There re-
mained the rhetorical and the emo
| tional appeals.
BRINGS TEARS TO WOMEN'S EYES.
! MI hot ha oil
turn to his wife and family, and to
restore himself in the esteem of his
! friends and business associates was so
! effectively made by Nathan Coghlan
! that 1t drew tears from Mrs. Anthony
\ Caminetti, mother of the co-defendant,
and had many of the other women in
the courtroom dabbing at their eyes
The two injured wives, who had testi-
fed for the defendant, after hearing
the most damaging admission from his
own lips, sat immobile.
| In view of the contention of the de-
| tense that no criminally immoral pur-
pose had been proved, the interpreta-
ton Of the statute by the Judge was
awaited with much interest.
CHARGE BY COURT PLAIN.
On this point he said IN part:
This act, so far as here involved,
provides in substance that any person
who shall knowingly transport in "*"
interstate commerce any woman or
girl for the purpose of prostitution or
debauchery or for any other immoral
purpose shall be deemed guilty
Of felony and punished as therein
provided.
The term interstate commerce, so
far as here involved, means transpor-
tation from one state to another
"As / have heretofore intimated to
you, it is immaterial what the char.
acter of the two girls involved in
these charges was at ;he time of the
acts charged. The act denounces the
carrying in interstate commerce for
the immoral purposes specified of any
woman or girl regardless OF
whether the girl or woman who is the
subject of the act be lewd or chaste, or
whether or not the man has himself
previously had intercourse with her.
TRUTH RESTS WITH JURY.
The defense is all before you, and
1t is for you TO say where the truth
rests. If you find these girls
were taken to Reno by the defendant
in the manner charged, then the only
question remaining is as to the intent
with which they were so taken. .
And even If you find that the de-
fendant and his companion were actu-
ated in their departure or fight from
Sacramento by fear of exposure or
arrest. but that nevertheless in taking
these two girls along there existed the