New Britain herald., 1927-11-23
Court Allows Doomed Lovers Anoth CT Christmas and New
 Year's-No Legal Re- course Open in State Judicial Department.
Gov. Smith, Alone, Has Power to Stop Execution Pair in Death Cells as Judges Sign Warrants Which Will Send Them to Grave.

Albany, \. Y, Nov. 23 upt-Tne
 week beginning January was fixed 1 by the court of appeals today for the execution, in the electric chair at Sing Sing prison. of Mrs. Ruth Brown Snyder Queens Village housewife and mother. and her , paramour Henry Judd Gray, for the murder of Mrs. Snyder's husband. Albert Snyder.
 Under the law. execution must
 take place not less than four weeks nor more than eight weeks after the
 date of sentence. Ordinarily, the
 court fixed a time midway between the maximum and minimum times. Clerk William J. Armstrong Of the court prepared the death war
 rants, setting the execution for the
 week of January 9. These were
 signed by all the judges of the court and were forwarded to Sing Sing prison where Mrs. Snyder and Gray
 are confined in the death house. Fixing the date of execution fol- lowed swiftly after the courts un- animous action in sustaining the 1 convictions of the blonde haired ] Mrs. Snyder and her corset salesman 1 companion. ! The only possible chance for life now left to the convicted pair is
 executive clemency at the hands of
 Governor Smith. It is considered q certainty that appeals for commuta- | ton of sentence to life imprison- ment will be presented to the gov
 ernor.
 The last legal recourse the couple had-with the exception of possible
 intervention by Governor Alfred E. Smith--failed yesterday. The court held the couple had a fair and im- partial hearing in Long Island City last summer.
 If Mrs. Snyder dies in the electric chair, she will have been the first
 woman executed in New York in IS
 years.
 Salient points in the text Of the
 opinion of the court of appeals in
 clude:
 "On March goth, 1927. Albert Snyder was killed while lying in bed at his home at Queens Village near
 Jamaica, New York. His wife, the defendant. Ruth Snyder, and their
 young. daughter were in the house
 at the time. The child's sleep was
 unhroken till Ruth Snyder awoke
 her some time after Snyder was kili- ed. Mrs. Snyder had been tied hand
 and foot, so she claimed, by rob- bers, and had become unconcious from fright and shock. The disturb ed condition of the house seemed to corrob crate her story that her hus- band had been killed by men who entered the house 10 steal. Never i theless, the police suspected the story. After questioning, she broke
 down and confessed that Henry Judd
 Gray had killed her husband, and that after the murder, he had, with her acquiescence, tied her hands and feet in order to divert suspicion | from themselves. Though in the confession she attempted to place ! the larger part Of the blame upon 1 Henry Judd Gray. yet she admitted acts on her part upon which the ! conclusion of her own guilty parti- i cipation might be drawn with contl- ! dence. Henry Judd Gray was there after apprehended in Syracuse. He 1 claimed at first that he had been in ! his room In Syracuse hotel at the ! time of murder. After questioning 1 he, too, confessed. According to ! that confession he had gone to 1 Queens Village, from Syracuse the
 evening before the murder and re- turned to Syracuse the next morn , ing. He had, in advance. arranged with Mrs. Snyder that they should | kill her husband that night.
 Preparation was complete. and he believed that he had successfully
 manufactured evidence which would show, if he were accused Of the | NluEQeT, that ne was Ut the tlTle III
 Syracuse. According to his confess
 sion Mrs. Snyder played a greater 1 part in the murder than she admit ted, but each confession If accepted
 as true would be sufficient to estab-
 fish the guilt of the person making
 1t for the crime of murder of Albert
 Snyder. Additional proof, which in
 this case was incontrovertible. that
 the crime charged had been commit ted. was of course available as re-
 quircd by section 395 of the code
 of criminal procedure. before the confessions would warrant convic- ton. ''ss
 Extended analysis of the testi-
 mony produced at the trial would
 serve no serious purpose. Both de- l fendants testified in their own be-.
 half Each attempted personal ex-
 culpation by throwing as much of, |