The daily Nome industrial worker., 1917-01-05
THE BILLINGS VERDICT.

The subjoined article is one will be read with interest in view ot Bourke Cochran's strictures on pro fessional jurors:
 Billings has been convicted Con victed in spite of his proven inno- cence For it is literally true that ih the Billings trial the prosecution not only failed to make out it's case. but the defense actually PROVED the innocence of Billings, proved that. even according to the States testimony. it was a physical imposs- ibility for Billings to have been at the place of the explosion.
 And yet Billings was convicted Was there ever a more crying injus- tice? No, not since the days of the Chicago Anarchists foully murdered by blind rage and bitter prejudice. Indeed. the San Francisco case is even more heinous in it's cold-blood- ed bestiality. For history can at least explain. if not palliate, the jul dicial murders of 1887 by tempo ray mental alteration of the peo pie, a virtual insanity of fear and hatred resulting from the bitter class feeling in the tremendous labor struggles of e days.
 No such se can be given in the Bilingl The people of San Francisco Wefe deeply stirred by the preparedness parade explosion, but they did not lose their heads. The tragedy filled them with grief, but they scorned the infamy of lynch law suggested by the Hearsts and their vile ilk. They refused to sanction a debauch of blood-drunk vengeance. They would not turn murderers. desps>shey mourned tlre.r AA W.T. patiently for the authorities to apprehend the guilty. They wouldn't shed innocent blood.
 What little hysteria the yellow press, which thrives on it, was able to arouse or stimulate, had all died out long before the Billings trial be- gan. The city had resumed it's nor nal life. the people followed their accustomed pursuits, and even in the courtroom nothing disturbed the even tenor of the usual legal proceedings, save the occasional Holy Jumper antics of the public prosecutor
 There was nothing in the atmos- phere in or out of the courtroom, nor anything beneath the surface of the life of San Francisco, to indicate unusual interest in the trial. The preparedness parade, nay, it's very object. was all but forgotten. The bomb passed into history and the great bulk Of the citizenship evinced no particular interest in the trial because it was generally felt that the police had failed to find ciew to the real perpetrators of the ex- plosiOn, and that the criminal pro ceedings against Billings, ct al, were somewhat ungraceful mode of the District Attorneys oihco rather than a serious attempt to fasten the crime on the accused 1t was therefore generally felt that 'ha arrested labor men were mere police scapegoats, and that there was no ease against them. And wien tAc | public prosecutor insisted on cnarg- 1 ing Billings ct al. with a ''c"nspir. ! acy to dynamite people holding dI!- 1 ferent social views and was sarcas- tically sat upon by Judge Dunne who demanded actual evidence in- stead of vague charges of a general world" the public was convinced that the District Attorney was mere ly trying to save his official face.
 But when the actual trial of the bomb plot began, and the prose- cution introduced it's witnesses, It quickly became apparent that there was indeed plot. a deep. sinister f plot, not a bomb plot, however, but | a plot to clear the Disctrict At | torney's office of the charge of in- | and at the same time stifie | the voices of certain men who had | become a thorn in the flesh of the | enemies of Labor.
 Like the scenes of some absorbing l drama, the conspiracy" was being | on the stage of the dingy | Within the railing, on seats. sat the main actors of this intense human play: Warren K Billings the first of the accused |