Bisbee daily review., 1918-09-21
DICK HIGHFIELD IS CONVICTED OF
 RAPE
FEELING WAS HIGH WHILE LIT TILE GIRL OF ELEVEN REcITED HER sToRY-PLEADs HIS OWN CAsE-WAs PROUD THAT HE SERVED PRISON TERM

In the superior court at Tombstone
 yesterday Richard Stone Highfield
 was convicted of the crime of statu-
 tory rape committed in this city on
 the fifth of July. He will be sentenced
 this morning by Judge McAlister, who
 is in Florence
 The case was the first one called yesterday morning and it took until about II o'clock to secure the jury.
 The state was represented by County Attorney John F. Ross and assistant Maurice Blumenthal, and the defend ant by s. W. White, of Douglas. There
 was considerable feeling expressed in the court room while the little girl was on the witness stand and told of her sufferings and humiliatiOns at the
 hands of the defendant not only in Bisbee but at Globe and other places. There were a number of men in the court room that expressed the opinion that he should be lynched and that they would be willing to help do it. These expressions were expressed to one another and there was consider able talk on the streets during the noon recess.
 " NOuAl lGcullGu lL6 htllDGId- tions Sheriff Welch had taken the precaution to have several additional officers about the court room to pre- vent any demonstration that might be started.
 The testimony of the little girl, cor roborated by the statements made by three 'men who were in adjoining rooms in the Moose hotel at the time of the offense and the facts testified to by the doctors as the result of their examination was sufficient to convince the jury.
 The defendant requested to be al- lowed to argue his own case to the jury and he was allowed to do so. He stated that he was an outlaw from Ar and that it had been brought out that he had already served a term in the penitentiary at Florence for cattle stealing and that he was proud of the fact. He stated that he was only in- side of the walls for two days and that he was then made a trusty and was paroled by Governor Hunt and later pardoned by him. He related his expe- riences in joining the army and that he had been discharged. He also statde that he was an outlaw from Ar genuine Republic, that he had taken a girl of 12 years of age away from there as she was in debt to another man and that was the custom there to keep them in bondage and had talk en her to San Francisco and that all the time he was on the way out of there with her until he landed in San Francisco that he slept with her ev- cry night. He manifested his inno- cence and stated that if there was a God above that he hoped that he would be struck dead that minute if he was guilty of the crime as charged by the state. He intimated that it was possible for the state to have coaxed the little girl into saying what she had on the witness stand as they had been keeping her since to con- of the offense. In this con- nection the little girl told no differ ent story on the witness stand than she had told the next day after had been arrested, to Coun- ty Attorney Ross and Probation Of ficer Miss Esther Cummings.
 The jury was out about twenty-five when they brought in their verdict. The crime of which he is convicted is punishable by confine- ment in the state prison for life or for any term of years not less than five.