Audubon County journal. (Exira, Iowa) 1884-1993, 1915-04-29
49,.
Ferretingg Out !
An injustice
1t Was All Gane BY a Young Law. J
yer For an Attractive Widow. .
By WILLARD BRAKEMAN
By WILLARD BRAKEMAN

There has been the same develop
menl in Jurisprudence as in everything
csc From he time of trial by battle
to trial by jury there has been con
tinued progress. and. strange to say.
there are more reforms being consider
ed today than ever before. In other
pensed in our criminal courts is dying
out
The reason of this is that legal jus.
lice is mechanical. and mechanical con-
trivanceS do not always work The
many ingenious happenings that have
been coniured up by detective story
writer's have doubtless helped to make
people chary of believing in the insali-
bility of courts. l. as IL criminal law,
Yer. have often. by thought and energy
alune. turned the results of IL months
trial into an absuidity In the first
innucence from intuition. After that
think and work principally the lat
Ter
WAS in criminal courtroom one
day when young woman was con
ticted of having sent dose OF choral
Ia her husband | watched her counte.
nance and made UP my mind from it's
emotional expression that she was in
nocent. You may sneer at judgment
from emotional expression. but it is
often the basis of my efforts In my
profession. If you ask me how can
process am forced to admit that /
cannot enlighten you
The case | have referred to is this
Edith Atwnter married. through the
influence of her mother, Martin Hay
wood, an elderly man. who was
wealthy. 1t was May and December
match. and December soon froze the
sap Of May The couple lived unhan
PLY together Haywood was ii chronic
invalid. and this with age made hin
peevish. He was very parsimuninus
and would not have a doctor. constant
ly experimenting with remedies which
he procured himself
The usual way for a young wife tn
get rid of an old husband is by poison.
and the favorite poison is arsenic
The arsenic is always discovered in the
deceased's stomach. but this does moi
seem to deter candidates for widow
hood from using it.
Old Haywood died under very suspi-
| cious circumstances. These were that
he was ill for some time and no doctor
was in attendance. No druggist in the
town where he lived and died had sold
him any medicines. How could man
die without doctor or even druggist
/ to help him? The idea was preposter-
! Gus. 1t was the neighbors who noticed
| these incongruities. and their tongues
, wagged at one another accordingly
| The rumors came to the knowledge of
| the police. who exhumed the body; u
| chemist made an analysis and found
arsenic.
4 This was sufficient evidence in itself
to convict his wife OF having poisoned
him. But the courts. which are in.
/ stituted to give all accused persons the
! same chance before the law and use
1 the same machinery for the innocen,
as for the guilty, insist upon putting
both through the legal mill. A person
brought up in refinement and morality
is ground out through the same mill
as Black Hand murderer who. by 9
signal, informs witness that If he
tells the truth his life will pay the
| forfeit
Mrs. Haywood was brought to trial
and. as have said, was in the court
room when she was sentenced. She
had been convicted by the law ma
chine, twelve good and true men being
its spokesman. and was sentenced t.
life Imprisonment. l knew that shs
J was innocent How? have told yor
!. that | cannot tell you this. Scoffers
1 have since said that l mistook sym
pathy for intuition. Let them scott
| will admit that l went away from
the courtroom with heavy heart an(
that the agony of despair in tina,
beautiful face haunted me. 1t con
| tinued to haunt me. When at the enc
of several months found | could no.
get rid of it | determined that mus
prove the innocence of the subject o.
it or continue to suffer indefinitely.
determined to begin work for which
would receive no pecuniary compen
sation.
Having procured copy of the evi
dence in Mrs Haywood's case, afte
studying it made up my mind, not
/ withstanding the fact that Haywood
had bought no drugs during his illness
that he had taken more arsenic thar
was good for him. Whether it had pro
duced his death or not did not matter
His widow had been convicted Of kill
ing him by giving him poison on thu
ground that he had not bought it him
self and she had bought it. This wa.
evidence enough for the court. but i
was not enough for me.
was tempted to go to the prisol
n