Facts And Fictions Of Life Part 2

These questions came forcibly to my mind as I listened to the prosecutor in the trial for homicide. He not only presented the facts as they were, but he drew inferences, twisted meanings, a.s.serted that the case had but one side; that the defendant was a dangerous animal to be at large; that his witnesses had all lied; that his lawyer was a notorious special pleader and had wilfully distorted every fact in the case. He waxed wroth and shook his fist in the face of his antagonist and appealed to every prejudice and sentiment of the jury which might be played upon to the disadvantage of the accused. He sat down mopping his face and flas.h.i.+ng his eyes. The Judge gave his charge, which, to my mind, was clearly indicative of the fact that he, at least, felt that there were two very serious sides to the case. The audience which had so relished the two preceding speeches, found the Judge tame, and when the jury filed out, half of the audience went also. Most of them were laughing, highly amused by "the way the prosecutor gave it to him" as I heard one lad of seventeen say. The moment the Judge left the stand there was great chaffing amongst the lawyers, and much merry-making. The prisoner and his friends sat still. The prosecutor smilingly poked his late legal adversary under the ribs and asked in a tone perfectly audible to the prisoner, "Lied, did I? Well, I rather think I singed your bird a little, didn't I?" When he reached the door, he called back over his shoulder--making a motion of a pendant body--"Down goes McGinty!"

Everyone laughed. That is to say, everyone except the white-faced prisoner and his mother. He turned a shade paler and she raised a handkerchief to her eyes. Several boys walked past him and stopped to examine him closely. One of them said, so that the prisoner could not fail to hear, "He done just right. I'd 'adone it long before, just like his lawyer said."

"Me too. You bet," came from several other lads--all under twenty years of age.

And still we waited for the jury to return. The prisoner grew restless and was taken away by an officer to the pen. There was great laughter and joking going on in the room. Several were eating luncheons abstracted from convenient pockets. I turned to an officer, and asked:

"Do you not think all this is bad training for boys? It must show them very clearly that it is a mere game of chance between the lawyers with a life for stakes. The best player wins. They must lose all sense of the seriousness of crime to see it treated in this way."

"Upon the other hand," said he, "they learn, if they stay about criminal courts much, that not one in ten who is brought here escapes conviction, and not one in ten who is once convicted, fails to be convicted and sent up over and over again. Once a criminal, always a criminal. If they get fetched here once they might as well throw up the sponge."

"Is it so bad as that?" I asked. He nodded. "Is there not something wrong with the penal inst.i.tutions then?" I queried.

"How?"

"You told me a while ago," I explained, "that almost all first crimes or convictions were of boys under seventeen years of age. Now you say that not one in ten brought here, accused, escapes conviction, and not one in ten of these fails to be convicted over and over again. Now it seems to me that a boy of that age ought not to be a hopeless case even if he has been guilty of one crime; yet practically he is convicted for life if found guilty of larceny, we will say. Is there not food for reflection in that?"

"I do' know," he responded, "mebby. If anybody wanted to reflect. I guess most boys that hang around here don't spend none too much time reflectin' though--till _after_ they get sent up. They get more time for it then," he added, dryly.

"Another thing that impresses me as strange," I went on, "is the apparent determination of the prosecutor to convict even where there is a very wide question as to the degree of guilt."

"I don't see anything queer in that. He's human. He likes to beat the other lawyer. Why, did you know that the prosecutor you heard just now is cousin to a lord? His first cousin married Lord--------."

This was said with a good deal of pride and a sort of proprietary interest in both the lord and the fortunate prosecutor. I failed to grasp just its connection with the question in point to which I returned.

"But the public prosecutor is not, as I understand it, hired to convict but to represent the 'people,' one of whom is the accused. Now, is the State interested in convictions only--does it employ a man to see that its citizens are found guilty of crime, or is it to see that justice is done and the facts arrived at in the interest of _all_ the people, including the accused?"

"I guess that is about the theory of the State," he replied, laughing as he started for the door, "but the practice of the prosecuting attorney is to convict every time if he can, and don't you forget it."

I have not forgotten that nor several other things, more or less important to the public, since my day in a Criminal Court.

It may be interesting to the reader to know that the jury in the case cited, disagreed. At a new trial the accused was acquitted on the grounds of self defense and the prosecutor no doubt felt that he was in very poor luck, indeed: "For," as I was told by a court officer, "he has lost his three last homicide cases and he's bound to convict the next time in spite of everything, or he won't be elected again. I wouldn't like to be the next fellow indicted for murder if he prosecutes the case, even if I was as innocent as a spring lamb," said he succinctly.

Nor should I.

But aside from this thought of the strangely anomalous att.i.tude of the State's attorney; aside from the thought of the possible influence of such court room scenes upon the boys who flock there--who are largely of the cla.s.s easily led into, and surrounded by, temptation; aside from the suggestions contained in the officer's statement--which I cannot but feel to be somewhat too sweeping, but none the less ill.u.s.trative, that only one in ten brought before the Criminal Court escapes conviction, and only one in that ten fails to be reconvicted until it becomes practically a conviction for life to be once sent to a penal inst.i.tution; aside from all this, there is much food for thought furnished by a day in a Criminal Court room. A study of the jury, and of the judge, is perhaps as productive of mental questions that reach far and mean much, as are those which I have briefly mentioned; for I am a.s.sured by those who are old in criminal court practice, that my day in court might be duplicated by a thousand days in a thousand courts and that in this day there were, alas, no unusual features. One suggestive feature was this. When the jury--an unusually intelligent looking body of men--was sworn for the next case, seven took the oath on the Bible and five refused to do so, simply affirming. This impressed me as a large proportion who declined to go through the ordinary form; but since it created no comment in the court room, I inferred that it was not sufficiently rare to attract attention, while only a few years ago, so I was told, it would have created a sensation. There appeared to be a growing feeling, too, against capital punishment. Quite a number of the talesmen were excused from serving on the jury on the ground of unalterable objection to this method of dealing with murderers. They would not hang a man, they said, no matter what his crime.

"Do you see any relation between the refusal to take the old form of oath, and the growth of a sentiment or conscientious scruple against hanging as a method of punishment"? I inquired of the officer.

"I do' know. Never thought of that. They're both a growin'; but I don't see as they've got anything to do with each other."

But I thought possibly they had.

II. IN THE POLICE COURT.

The next week I concluded to visit two of the Police Courts. I reached court at nine o'clock, but it had been in session for half an hour or more then, and I was informed that "the best of it was over." I asked at what time it opened. The replies varied "Usually about this time." "Some where around nine o'clock as a rule." "Any time after seven," etc. I got no more definite replies than these, although I asked policemen, doorkeeper, court officer, and Justice. Of one Justice I asked, "What time do you close?"

"Any time when the cases for the day are run through," he replied.

"To-day I want to get off early and I think we can clear the calendar by 10:30 this morning. There is very little beside excise cases to-day and they are simply held over with $100 bail to answer to a higher court for keeping their public houses open on Sunday. Monday morning hardly ever has much else in this court."

I was seated on the "bench" beside the Judge. At this juncture a police officer stepped in front of the desk with his prisoner, and the Justice turned to him.

"Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole tr--'n--g b tr'th--selp y'

G.o.d. Kissthebook."

The policeman had lifted the greasy volume, and with more regard for his health than for the form of oath, had carried it in the neighborhood of his left cheek and as quickly replaced it on the desk.

"What is the charge?" inquired the Justice.

"Open on Sunday," replied the officer succinctly.

"See him selling anything?"

"No. I asked for a drink an' he told me he was only lighting up for the night and wasn't sellin' nothing."

"Anybody inside?"

"Only him an' me."

"You understand that you are ent.i.tled to counsel at every stage of this proceeding," said the Justice to the accused man. "What have you to say for yourself?"

"Your Honor, I have a dye house, and a small saloon in the corner. I always light the gas at night in both and have it turned low. I had on these clothes. I was not dressed for work. I went in to light up and he followed me in, and arrested me and I have been in jail all night. I sold nothing."

"Is that so, officer?" asked the Justice.

"Yes, your Honor, it is so far as I know. I seen him in there lighting the gas, an' I went in an' asked for a drink, an' he said he wasn't selling an' I arrested him."

"Give the record to the clerk. Discharged," said the Justice, and then turning to me he explained: "You see he had to arrest the man for his own protection. If a police officer goes into a saloon and is seen coming out, and doesn't make some sort of an arrest, he'll get into trouble; so, for his protection he had to arrest the man after he once went in, and I have to require that record, by the clerk, to show why, after he was brought before me, I discharged him. That is for my protection."

"What is for the man's protection?" I asked. "He has been in jail all night. He has been dragged here as a criminal to-day, and he has a court record of arrest against him all because he lighted his own gas in his own house That seems a little hard, don't you think so?"

The Judge smiled.

"So it does, but he ought to have locked the door when he went in to light up. Perhaps he was afraid to go in a dark room and lock his door behind him before he struck a light, but that was his mistake and this is his punishment. Next!"

Most of the cases were like this or not so favorable for the accused. In the latter instance they were held in bail to answer to a higher court.

Two or three were accused of being what the officer called "plain drunks" and as many more of being "fighting drunks" or "concealed weapon drunks." In these cases the charge was made by the officer who had arrested them. There was no suggestion that "you are ent.i.tled to counsel," etc., and a fine of from "$10 or ten days" to "$100 or three months" or both was usually imposed.

A pitiful sight was a woman, sick, and old, and hungry. "What is the charge against her, officer?" inquired the Justice.

"Nothing, your Honor. She wants to be sent to the workhouse. She has no home, her feet are so swollen she can't work, and--"

"Six months," said the Justice, and turned to me. "Now she will go to the workhouse, from there to the hospital, and from there to the dissecting table. Next."

I shuddered, and the door closed on the poor wretch who, asking the city for a home, only, even if that home were among criminals, received a free pa.s.s to three of the public inst.i.tutions sustained to receive such as she--at least so said the Justice to whom such cases were not rare enough to arouse the train of suggestions that came unbidden to me. He impressed me as a kind-hearted man, and one who tried to be a Justice in fact as well as in name. He told me that it was not particularly unusual for him to be called from his bed at midnight, go to court, light up, send for his clerk and hold a short session on one case of immediate importance--such as the commitment of a lunatic or the bailing of some important prisoner who declined to spend a night in jail while only a charge and not a conviction hung over him.