The daily Nome industrial worker., 1917-07-05
.jGRi ISiti.3 E,Ntt..

\ most important phase ot tine Mooney triaI ii Sal Francisco has been the address of tie prosecution gatfnHe tae case. I, is interesting tasf iii doing 50, as in the trials o1 Billings and iu Thomas Mooney, the prosecution was at pains to dwei! and elaborate upon what would be shown. And especially ill the trial of Mrs. Mooney was ii hecalded to inc world and directed with em- pRasis to the jurT that witnesses would show that she conspired with other desperate persons to terro- rjze san Francisco and to do other things quite in keeping with and equally as damnable as the crime of which she is charged. Statement by statement, unsupported by any thing but the ability of the speaker fo drive home his assertions with such eloquence, force and directness as his training to that end permit ted was unrayelled before the
 
 iurv to impress their minds and to create an atmosphere favorable for the reception of the most grotesque ideas concerning the defendant.
 This has always appeared to us the most extraordinary procedure in criminal trials. The state takes the jury into it's confidence and does not attempt to intimate that an effort will be made to do this or that. or that they will endeavor to show that this or that is so but that they will de this, that they do this. that they will do that, that they will prove this and they will prove that.
 Certainly enough attention is not paid to the unjust psychological ei- fleets of such statements upon the iury and how it creates an unfair, q partial and biased atmosphere around defendant which may not be shaken off by the average juror, and who unwittingly surrenders his mind to the voice that declares that such things are so.
 Really it is only of late years that the fact is admitted that a defend ant is in a criminal trial up against a dead hard game, quite regardless of his guilt or innocence, for he, when arrested and placed in the po- sition of a defendant, is facing jury with his guilt uncOnsciously entertained by them.
 It is quite immaterial that often enough the defense argues that the theory of the law is that man is innocent until he is proven guilty. The fact remains that the average juror will regard his being placed in the position of defendant as prima facie evidence in itself of guilt The average juror knows nothing about the finer legal technicalities or theories of Jurisprudence. All he knows is that he tries man for a
  rendant, much as a doctor faces man whom he is sent for to attend and as a sick man, as one who is there because he has done some thing wrong and it is up to the jury to measure the extent of that guilt, rather than to find him guiltless.
 d. vantage to which sufficient weight is not given ill the courts, and when added 10 this lawyer with ability shat has been cultivated and trained especially for that purpose, rises to the jury and tells them that he will prove that the defendant is a confirmed criminal, that his guilt is as scarlet, that he will will show that his malice was ap- parent, that he committed the act deliberately and knowingly and will | fully and for the evil purpose which | il was intended to accomplish, he 1 simply adds to the psychological disadvantage in which a defendant found himeslf at the very start,
 This was a marked feature Of the | 3rial of Mrs. Rena Mooney. Evid- | ence of a very dubious and conflict ing sort of her guilt was offered by dubious and very conflicting char a4cters, but it was presented after the attorneys had added to the ori- ginal atmosphere Of guilt surrounds ! any defendant by the most emphatic