The Fargo forum and daily republican., 1913-07-23
Anderson Juror Explains
Finding in the Case

. Ea-t 4 & y . i a p 81 !.
The Washburn Leader Of last week
contains the following communica-
ton: Garrison. N D., July 15.-
Editor Leader: In your issue of July
under the heading, Has Someone
Blundered? you made the statement,
THE jury is not wholly to blame for a
verdict Of this kind. and as the writer
was a member OF the jury in the
Anderson case, if you will give us the
space in your paper we will endeavor
to give you a little information which
1t seems you do not have relative to
the testimony In this case, and we
might say that your name appeared
on the information as one Of the wit
nesses, yet for some unaccountable
reason to the members Of the jury you
did not appear as a witness to give
your testimony. The jury certainly
expected that you and others whose
names appeared on the information
would give us the benefit of your
knowledge of the facts and circum-
stances surrounding this crime that
we could better judge of the guilt or
innocence of the defendant, Ander-
son, and we were as much surprised
when you and other reliable citizens
Old not appear as witnesses as we are
at your criticism, when you say that
the jury is not wholly to blame for
such verdict" And now in all fair
ness let us ask you q question and
trust you will answer it through your
paper in the next issue; "Why did
you and Aug. e. Johnson not appear
before the jury as witnesses in the
trial, as it was shown that you were
the persons whom it is said were on
the grounds and first accused Ander-
son of the murder of Funk? You
may nave some good reasons and in
all fairness we ask you to answer this
before you say that "the jury was not
wholly to blame for such a verdict of
this kind" Were you present to hear
the testimony of the witnesses on be-
half Of the state and the argument
or counsel so that you could be able
to say that judgment the jury should
pronounce on the case made out by
the state? II not, permit us to give
you little that the jury had to deal
with in this case and we believe that
you are fair minded enough to con-
cede that under all the circumstances
the jury could have brought in no
other contentious verdict under the
oath they took to we'll and truly try
the issue between the state and the
defendant. &c.. ~ d. ..
There appeared on the information
some seventy or more names Of citi-
zens OF Washburn and vicinity who
were to testify in this case, your name
among others, and not to exceed thirty
of them were called. First to testify
to one fact and then recalled to testify
to another fact and so on that it was
almost impossible to keep run of the
witness and what he testified to, which
deprived the juror of the benefit Of
each witness story of the events to
which he testified and got their proper
connection with the matter in issue
and on which the jury was to pass
judgment Granted that it may be a
logical way in which to proceed in the
tria! OF suit, but in our judgment
mighty unsatisfactory way in which
to try case involving so many wit
nesses and so many circumstances as
this case did. Now let us ask you the
first question we have in mind: Is the
jury wholly to blame for the method
of procedure in this case?