The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1915-09-03
Continued from Page H.

missioners to prosecute the miners,
nor requested by any district attorney
to appear against the miners, nor au-
thorized by any court to appear but
coal operators, and had appeared in
court for them in prosecutions against
the miners. The law of the state of
Colorado is well settled that when
such affidavits are filed, the judge of
the court loses jurisdiction, and has no
right to do anything except to call in
another judge to preside. But Judge
| Hillyer on March g, 1915, overruIed
Lawson's application for a change of
judge, and announced that he would
try the case himself.
THE ZANCANELLI TRIAL"
On March Is, 1915, Judge Hillyer
began the trial of Louis Zancanelli,
one of the strikers whose case came
On this trial the jurors were men
whose names had been sent to the
court by the board of county commits
sioners for jury service. In other
words, the jury was regularly drawn
from the jury box. This trial of Fan
canelli lasted about ten days, and re-
suited in a mistrial the majority of
the jurors voting not guilty, only
few of them voting for conviction.
1t then appeared to the coal operators
! that some other system than the reg
ular way of drawing jurors would
have to be resorted to in order to Sc
cure convistions, so they had their at
torney, Jesse G. Northcutt, who was
not a public official, and had never
been authorized by any public official
to appear in the cases, appear before
Judge Hillyer and ask that the jury
box be done away with, and that the
sheriff be authorized to select jury.
! This same attorney, Jesse G. North
cult, had testified before the congress
I
RADIO in February, 1914, that the jury
! had always to be drawn from the box
/ if defendant objected to an open
venire But on this occasion, behalf
of the coal companies he asked Judge
! HilIyer not to draw the jury from the
box, but to authorize the sheriff to
select the jurors, and Judge HiIlyer,
over the objections of defendant, &C
tuaIIy granted the request of the coal
company attorney The sheriff there
upon brought in as jurors, coal COM
pany doctors, coal company employees,
deputy sheriffs and men who had been
in conflicts with the miners, as jurors
to try the striking miners, and before
a jury of this class of men ZancaneIli
was placed on trial. The first jury
his favor On the second trial the
coal company attorney insisted that
jurors could not be asked the question
as to whether they could give the de-
PENDANT at the outset of the trial the
/ benefit of the presumption of nno-
cence. This simple question was OBJ
jected to, because if it had been per.
mitted to be asked and answered it
would have shown that the jurors
We're so partisan that they could not
give the defendant the benefit of his
cons -itutional rights. Judge Hillyer
sustained the objection of the coal
company attorney, and ruled the ques-
ton incompetent. He even refused
the attorney who appeared for Fan
Canelli permission to ask a juror
whether or not he, the juror, had been
/ in battles between the miners and the
alleged mine guards. Affidavits were
presented to Judge Hillyer showing
that one of the jurors was actually
betting on the result of the trial, and
/ had said that he would either hang
the defendant or hang the jury But
Judge Hillyer in the face of uncontra-
dicted affidavits, refused to allow the
juror to be questioned as to this fact.
The explanation, of course, of these
remarkable rulings is that Judge Hill
yer had been a part of the Legal ma
chinery of the coal companies in the
/ prosecution of the miners, and was so
prejudiced that he was unable to pre-
side fairly at the trial. The defendant
Iancanelli was thereupon placed on
trial before coal company partisans.
one of whom was gambling on the ver-
| dict The result of the trial was fore
convicted
/ PERSECUTION OF LAWSON
John r. Lawson was then placed
ON trial 4 motion was filed on his