The reverend came again today. As time grows shorter they seem to be sicking him onto me with increasing frequency. The governor has signed the execution warrant. Today I told him I was far too busy to grant him the standard courtesy of ten minutes of my time. I said I wanted to be certain I would complete this journal. He looked at me severely and told me it would be more fitting if I devoted the time to the nurture of my immortal soul. I told him that I agreed heartily, and I was looking for my immortal soul in my own fashion, and half expected to find it somewhere on these pages, and it would probably be a gray, sly little fellow in a gnome hat, peering maliciously out from behind a bad word. He went away, shaking his ecclesiastical head.
Ten
It is curious to note that during the weekend recess which was followed almost immediately by the summations of the prosecution and the defense and the judge’s charge to the jury, Riker Deems Owen, the attorney for the defense, used precious time and energy in the preparation of his final informal memorandum on the Wolf Pack Case.
Certainly the same time devoted to his summation would have resulted in a more effective job, but it is possible that Owen realized by that time, as did most of the perceptive spectators and communications people, that he had already lost his case. Even with a lost case, however, it would seem more in keeping with Owen’s evident egomania and distorted sense of history to have worked up a summation which he would hope would rank with the deathless ones of Darrow, one of his household gods.
There is the alternate assumption that Owen did give the preparation of his summation every morsel of time and energy he felt it required. Those of us who were present that icy day can be forgiven for believing that his final effort in the trial could have been improved upon, regardless of the outcome. His case was beyond saving. His professional reputation was not.
Though it is not pertinent, it is somehow touching to see how perfectly the Owen memoranda were typed by Miss Leah Slayter. They were without erasures, strikeovers. It is likely that whenever she made an error, she started the page over. Though this is prescribed procedure with legal documents, it could only be considered proper for informal memoranda when the typist has the feeling she is typing a work of great importance for a great man.
It is rather pleasant somehow to realize that this devoted employee was blind to the hapless performance of her boss in his most famous trial, and thought his rambling memoranda so precious as to deserve infinite care.
Certainly Riker Deems Owen’s total performance in that trial can be considered of the second-rate. If we assume it was a case no man could have won, we can at least say that there are men who could have come closer. The electrocution of a female is a startling example of the ineptitude of any defense attorney.
It was the post-trial derision in the public press which reduced Riker Deems Owen to a shrunken and rather hesitant old man.
At the time he wrote this final memo on the case, he was not absolutely certain he would lose the case. Certainly he had no suspicion that his conduct of the defense would cause him to be jeered at. He had no idea of placing his professional reputation on the line when he took the case. But sometimes we gamble without knowing what the stakes are.
Long days of testimony, of exhibits, objections, cross examinations tend to focus the mind and the attention on trivia, so that the larger issues are forgotten. John Quain is a clever, dogged, tireless prosecutor. I cannot take the chance of giving him perfectly free rein to establish the State’s case. I must protect my clients through emphasizing the chance of reasonable doubt in certain areas, in spite of my master plan of defense which borrows from certain interesting aspects of the Loeb-Leopold Case.
John Quain is perfectly aware of my obligation to weaken, insofar as is possible, his edifice of evidence, and thus I must be constantly alert to avoid the traps implicit in his presentation. This, despite the competent staff at my elbow, is an exhausting task.
I believe that I dug a few important holes in the testimony of the youngsters, Howard Craft and Ruth Meckler. The most significant one was Howard’s admission that it is possible that Arnold Crown struck the first blow, and due to their angle of observation, they missed it.
Murder in the first degree implies motive, opportunity and prior intent. The priority of intent need be only a matter of a split second. If a murderer had adequate reason to have a rock in his hand, premeditation would be difficult to establish. But should he seek a rock and bend and pick it up, premeditation exists during that interval. However, should he be struck or injured in any way before picking up the rock, the chance of proving premeditation is weakened thereby.
Would that I were permitted to defend these people before a judge and jury and spectators who had never heard of their wicked exploits. Justice, in the circumstances I face, is a farce. A whole nation watches these four human beings. An outraged nation demands they be executed. You can feel the weight of all the pressure in that courtroom. It is a tangible heaviness. If Stassen, Golden, Hernandez and Koslov had come from the most remote planet of the galaxy, if they were creatures of slime and tentacles, they could not be watched with any more curiosity and revulsion.
They are being tried for what was done to the salesman, to the Nashville people, to Arnold Crown and to Helen Wister, not just for Crown alone. So this case is only symbolic, and hence my defense is the only possible one.
It is interesting to see the various ways the four of them accept their long hours on trial. Stassen, in his well-cut flannel suit, with his polite, attentive and somewhat detached manner, would look much more at home at the press table. He writes me short notes from time to time. Some of them have been mildly helpful. I have noticed that he often stares directly at his jurors. I sense that he seems to baffle them, that they cannot equate his demeanor with the evidence presented.
The idleness, the enforced spectator role is most difficult for Sander Golden to endure. He jitters and twitches endlessly, keeping a dozen mannerisms going at the same time. He whispers and mutters to the other defendants until he has to be silenced a half dozen times a day. He stares with bright mockery at every member of the jury in turn until they look away. He has written me foolish notes in an awkward hand, miserably spelled.
The girl sits placidly. She plays with her hair. She nibbles her nails. She yawns, and often, out of boredom, sighs audibly, recrosses her legs, scratches her thigh, yawns again. She cannot understand why she cannot have magazines to look at. Sometimes she draws the same face over and over again, the empty comic-book face of a pretty girl.
Robert Hernandez endures it with the silent, unmoving patience of an ox. His metabolism is low, his deep, slow breathing imperceptible. A bear in a cage, when it is not pacing, will endure in that same way. He stares at the floor fifteen feet in front of him. A hairy fist lies slack on the table. The jury regards him with more assurance. This is a criminal type. Can’t you see it?
I have tried to analyze the tangible emanations of hate that come from the spectators. It is uncommon, even in murder trials. I believe I have the reason for it. They did not kill for profit. Their entire adventure netted them less than fifteen hundred dollars, and finding so much cash on Crown was an accident they could not have anticipated.