Counselor Ingham's Speech.
Mr. Geo. W. Ingham, in behalf of the State, followed Mr. Donahoe with a forcible review of the evidence, and which was listened to with intense interest by every one within reach of his voice. He prefaced his remarks by saying that the sanctity of human life in America was in the keeping of the juries of America. The law provided that a man guilty of murder should be punished, but it provided no method for its own enforcement, save that which was invested in twelve men. To that number of men it was entrusted. The jury came from the body of the county, and so it was that peace and good order of every community was in the keeping of its own citizens. In every criminal case the jury held in one hand the rights of the prisoners, and, to a certain extent, it held in the other hand the good name and the peace of the community in which it lived. This was a responsibility already great, but which increased in direct proportion to the enormity of the offense under consideration. Yet no responsibility could be greater than that of the twelve men before him. Only a few months before, Patrick Henry Cronin, a citizen of the State of Illinois, a resident of the great metropolis, living in fancied security and within the very shadow of the court-house in which they were now sitting, was lured from his home upon a mission of murder. Fired by professional zeal, moved by the instincts of humanity which his choice of a profession indicated, he rushed to the assistance of a suffering man. Suspecting nothing, he went out, armed, as it were, with the very instruments of his skill and profession, and then rushed into the slaughter-house prepared for his reception and death.
Then, as if the white face of death itself was not sufficient to satiate human hatred, his body was subjected to the indignity and ignominy of burial in a filthy sewer. This man, to whom sacred burial in consecrated ground was a right to which he always looked forward, was thrown into a sewer. The crime was singular in its brutality, but its brutality was not its startling feature. Why was Dr. Cronin slain? Because he was condemned to die. Condemned for what? For no offense within the laws of the State of Illinois. Condemned and executed by whom? By a tribunal that was unlawfully constituted, a tribunal that was at the same time, accuser, witness, judge and executioner. It was a tribunal which within itself in the light of day, which existed upon a territory of the State to whom its members hold allegiance, a tribunal which was treasonable to the laws of the State, the juries were called upon to execute and to the laws of the State whose protection it had a right to claim. Who could have dreamed that such a thing was possible in the State of Illinois? Who could say that six months from that day he could not be repeated in the State of Illinois. Only the twelve men who were trying the case. That was their responsibility, for their oath in the case was to well and truly try and true deliverance make between the people of the State of Illinois and the defendants, to well and truly try them upon the law and upon the evidence.
GEORGE C. INGHAM, ONE OF COUNSEL FOR PROSECUTION.
From this introduction, Mr. Ingham branched off into an elaborate dissertation of the law regarding murder and the power of circumstantial evidence. Numerous authorities on circumstantial evidence were cited from. Counsel dwelt upon Coughlin's hatred of Cronin, upon the purchase of the furniture and upon the peculiar actions of the defense. Stress was laid upon the fact, that no evidence had been produced with a view of showing that it was not Martin Burke that rented the Carlson cottage, and that he engaged the expressman to move the furniture from the Clark street flat to Lake View. The general outline of the plot as disclosed by the evidence was considered, and the conclusion drawn, that the right men were on trial. Continuing, Mr. Ingham said:
"Now, I want to call your attention to one fact, that not one attempt has been made at defense. The counsel for the defense have done the best they could. I know the counsel for the defense well. I know Forrest, and have known him for years, and have tried cases with and against him. I know he would go far and near and would remove heaven and earth, were it possible, to save his clients. I know that he believes thoroughly and heartily in the maxim of old Lord Brougham, that a lawyer should know but one man in the world, and that man his client. I have known Daniel Donahoe for years, and I know his ability. I have not known Judge Wing for so long a time, but from what I have seen of him and know of him I know him to be a skillful lawyer. His address to you, gentlemen of the jury, proves his ability, and I say to you unhesitatingly, that these men, after doing everything in their power to aid their clients, have utterly and signally failed. I ask you to remember that not one particle of evidence has been introduced by the defense either to dispose or disprove the evidence I have stated to you. Not one particle of evidence has been admitted to be proved and to be denied here, except the single statement that Burke was at the cottage on the night of the murder. There is evidence, however, which more than outweighs all the alibis they can bring here.
"The saloon-keeper came upon the stand here and plainly and clearly told you that on the night of the 4th of May, about half-past 10 o'clock, three men entered his saloon. He tells you he is positive one of them was Patrick O'Sullivan. He knows him, buys ice of him, and has no earthly reason to give evidence to injure him unless it was true. He says also that the other was a taller man, and in his opinion he believes that man was Coughlin; further, there was a little man who spoke with a German accent, and that man he says he is sure was Kunze. Now, you will remember he had only bought that saloon a few days before, and he can hardly be mistaken in the night, because he tells you he knows it was on the Saturday night, because on the night following, the Sunday night, he had an opening, and, like other Germans, he never had less than fifteen to twenty-five men at his bar. What object could he have in testifying against Patrick O'Sullivan, Coughlin and Kunze, and saying they were the men who drank wine and took cigars at his bar? Is he corroborated? Let us see. The saloon-keeper is admittedly as honest a man as there is in Chicago. No attempt has been made to impeach his evidence, and I ask you to consider whether or not he is corroborated. Let me draw your attention to the evidence given by the German gardener named Wardell. They left the saloon about 11 o'clock or a quarter after, the saloon-keeper says, and you will remember that Wardell says he left a saloon near by about twenty minutes after, and just at that time he happened to raise his eyes and saw in front of him two men, whom he describes, and believes to be O'Sullivan and Coughlin, and he saw them walk down to and enter the Carlson cottage. Where was the third man? Do you remember that about a half hour after that time, about half a mile south of the Carlson cottage, a wagon was seen with a trunk in it? The two men who went into the Carlson cottage went in there to help carry out the trunk containing Cronin's body and the clothes, while the third man went down and got the wagon that was to take the body and the clothes away.
"Now, how is that met? We are told that the saloon-keeper is mistaken, that this man never saw O'Sullivan and Coughlin and Kunze, but that on the Sunday night Patrick O'Sullivan went there to that very saloon with the two Hylands, and that they had two glasses of wine and a cigar each. Gentlemen, you will remember that the saloon-keeper, who is a German, distinctly said that the smaller man asked for beer and spoke with a German accent. The younger Hyland never spoke with a German accent in his life. Which do you propose to believe—Neiman, the saloon-keeper, who has no earthly interest whatever in giving false testimony against O'Sullivan or the friends of Patrick O'Sullivan? These two strangers who go to see him for the first time are compelled to stay and take dinner, and are then taken out to the saloon and each given two glasses of wine and a cigar at the expense of O'Sullivan. Remember, gentlemen, he had never seen these two Hylands before that Sunday afternoon. The truth is, that when they say those three men were in that saloon, the two Hylands and O'Sullivan, they admit unconsciously the fact that three men were there, as the saloon-keeper testified; they admit that O'Sullivan was there and the thing is narrowed down to a simple question of veracity between the saloon-keeper on the one hand and the Hylands on the other. There is much more reason, vastly more reason, I submit, why the evidence of the saloon-keeper, who knew O'Sullivan perfectly, should be believed in preference to that of the two Hylands, who are ready to swear anything to help their friend out of a scrape. Now, what else is disputed?
"An attempt is also made to dispute that portion of the evidence tending to show that O'Sullivan was at the Carlson cottage. How is it done? Again they resort to an alibi. As I said to you in the opening of this case, and I will now repeat, that if O'Sullivan was at home and in bed at the time the murder was committed, and you are satisfied from the evidence that he was engaged in that conspiracy, he is just as guilty as if he struck the fatal blow himself. Against the testimony of Neiman, who saw him there with Coughlin and Kunze in that saloon, and of Wardell, who saw him and Coughlin enter the Carlson cottage after they left the saloon, they produce the evidence of Mulcahey, a man who became connected with O'Sullivan under the most suspicious circumstances. That man testified that he came to Chicago a perfect stranger; that he went to O'Sullivan—went to his house on the 31st of April—was instantly taken in and kept and boarded there, slept in the same bed with O'Sullivan, rolled around the street in the ice wagon and slept with him on the night of the murder. He swears also that he was with O'Sullivan when old Carlson claimed to have heard the conversation between O'Sullivan and Burke; he swears also that he heard Coughlin and O'Sullivan arrange that O'Sullivan was to keep his eye upon Kunze and report if he saw him in Lake View. In short, gentlemen, he was a very convenient sort of witness. What was he doing there all the month? He was not working for O'Sullivan, yet he slept in the same bed with him—a perfect stranger, and, strange as it may appear, he only went into the employ of O'Sullivan a few days before the murder. I undertake to say, gentlemen, that his testimony is false, that O'Sullivan was not in bed, that on the contrary he and Burke and Coughlin were engaged in the murder at the Carlson cottage. Who is there that corroborates his testimony? The two women, a cousin of O'Sullivan's by marriage and his sister. Tom Whelan was too sound a sleeper to know whether O'Sullivan was in bed or was up or out, and they ask you to believe that sort of an alibi against the evidence you have on the part of the prosecution."
KUNZE'S PART IN THE MURDER.
"What is the evidence against Kunze? He was the friend, the tool of Coughlin. It is in evidence that he had been engaged with Dan Coughlin in working up the distillery case. How much of a detective he is I do not know, but I don't suppose he is a very great one. If I were to guess at it I should say he was a detective's stool pigeon.
"He had been engaged with Coughlin for months. Mertes swears that he saw him drive their horse with a white face up to the cottage the night of the murder, and you will remember that he picked him out from a number of men. Mertes is a countryman of Kunze's, and he would not be likely to testify against his own countryman unless truth compelled him to do so. He tells you that Kunze drove a horse and buggy up to that Carlson cottage at 8:30 o'clock on the night of the murder, and, more than that, it is in evidence that Kunze was perfectly at home in the rooms at 117 Clark street, and was seen by a very intelligent witness sitting in front of the window washing his feet. Now, what was he doing at 117 South Clark street, if he was not engaged in that conspiracy? The men who engaged that flat at 117 Clark street, those conspirators, were not going to trust their lives to men they did not know; and the truth is that he was the tool of Coughlin. More than that, it is in evidence that he said he expected to be arrested on the Cronin business. Why? Why? I repeat."
"Because I was told so," suddenly cried Kunze, springing to his feet.
"This man is defended by able lawyers," retorted Mr. Ingham, "and on their heads is the responsibility of his defense."
"God knows I am innocent of the murder of Dr. Cronin," cried Kunze, again springing to his feet, and there was a scene of excitement for a few minutes. Finally his counsel forced him to his seat, and induced him to remain quiet.
"Why did he say he expected to be arrested on the Cronin business? I repeat," continued Mr. Ingham. "It was because he felt he was connected with that business. Coughlin knew him, Coughlin had worked with him, and Coughlin knew that in this case their lives were safe in his hands. It is in evidence that shortly after the murder he was with Patrick O'Sullivan drinking, and you will remember a conversation which was detailed by a saloon-keeper, and which occurred shortly before the murder, wherein Patrick O'Sullivan made a bargain to sell to Kunze the bay horse with a white face. Why was that horse sold to Kunze, this little painter who was working around the country, this man who was in the employ of the detective and trusted by Coughlin? Will you, gentlemen of the jury, tell me why O'Sullivan, who lived at the rear of the Carlson cottage, and whose stable almost abutted on the cottage, was selling this poor painter a horse?"
WHOM THE EVIDENCE POINTS TO.
"I have gone over the salient features of the evidence, and I say unhesitatingly that there is evidence which points directly to Coughlin; it points directly to Patrick O'Sullivan, and it points directly to Burke, unerringly to those three as having a direct connection with the murder of Dr. Cronin. Are those isolated men, scattered over the city, having no bond of harmony? On the contrary, the evidence is that four of those men on trial were bound together by a bond. Judge Wing said the murder in this case was different from an ordinary case. He said truly. The motive was not robbery; it was not personal hate, but it was hatred, political hatred in its nature, growing out of a political conspiracy. That conspiracy originated in Camp 20, and it is in evidence that Beggs, Coughlin, O'Sullivan and Burke are members of that camp. There you have the start of it. In the course of circumstances, Sullivan made the contract which was to lure the doctor to destruction; Coughlin told the chief of police and told Thomas O'Connor that his enmity toward Cronin grew out of secret society matter and was of long standing. Simonds buys the furniture, Burke hires the house—the Carlson Cottage—and the full arrangements are made for the butchery of their victim. It is also in evidence that Coughlin wanted Sampson to slug the Doctor, and up to that time he had not got to the pitch when he wanted him killed, but you will see how it grew. The evidence shows he denounced him as a spy, and on the Monday morning after the murder, when he admitted his enmity to the Doctor, the Doctor's body was lying in the catch-basin.
"How about Patrick O'Sullivan? We find after the murder he goes to see Mrs. O'Farrer, and she says to him it is an awful murder. He replied 'Yes.' She then asked why did they kill him. Now, mark his reply. He says: 'They say he was a spy and gave away the secrets of the order to which he belonged, and if he did he should be killed.' Here you have the conspirators of Camp 20 at work.
"Where did the trouble begin? Recollect that O'Sullivan says to Mrs. O'Farrer when he was at her house that, 'They say Cronin gave away the secrets of the order to which he belonged.' It is in evidence in this case that the only secrets that Cronin ever gave away were about embezzlement of the money and the sending of their brethren to English prisons. You know also that it is in evidence in this case that the very first hostility toward Cronin was made apparent in Camp 20 of the Clan-na-Gael organization. There was constant turmoil and trouble in the Clan-na-Gael organization because of the embezzlements and the wrong doing of the triangle. It is in evidence also that Dr. Cronin charged at the trial of that triangle that they had embezzled over $100,000 of the funds of the organization besides sending patriotic Irishmen into British prisons. Whether that be true or false we have not been permitted to show. So far as this case is concerned it is immaterial whether true or false. You are an American jury; this is an American court; these defendants are here under indictment, and you are called upon to administer American law; and whether Dr. Cronin may have been a spy or an honest man and a patriot cuts no figure whatever in this case. One thing, however, I can say. When that sewer gave up its dead, it opened up the sunlight of heaven on these charges. 'Cronin was killed,' says O'Sullivan: 'he was killed because he gave away the secrets of his order,' and I repeat the only secrets he could have given away were the embezzlement of the funds and the imprisonment of their brothers. His mouth was closed and his charges were forever stopped by his death. That swollen and distorted body, those mute lips, prove the truth of his charges more clearly than any court or jury could possibly do, and if these charges were not true there would have been no motive for them to put him out of the way. Thomas O'Connor tells you he was present at a meeting of Camp 20 when a man, Foy, arose, and said they had better look out for spies, and there were other Le Carons among them. He says that he made a speech to that effect, I may not give you the exact details, and O'Connor said in reply that they had better look out for the men who were embezzling the funds of the organization and sending their brothers to English prisons. A storm arose. The records of that meeting show three things: They show, first, a resolution to the effect that hereafter no member should be initiated whose name had not been submitted to all the camps. They show, secondly, that a demand was proposed to be made on the executive for information in regard to the Buffalo trial, that is the trial of the triangle; and thirdly, that that was amended or changed so as to read that information should be asked from the district member.
"That record also shows the appointment, or passage of a resolution for the appointment of a secret committee of three by the senior guardian to investigate rumors afloat regarding the trial committee. What were they? O'Connor has told you that the charges were what he made, and he and others say that the camp where these charges were made was known as Dr. Cronin's camp. Denis O'Connor and others say they knew to whom Thomas O'Connor referred. To investigate the matter of these rumors then meant to investigate the men who put these rumors afloat. That man was killed, foully slain, and his body thrown into the sewer. Now Beggs wrote to the district member. Beggs asked the district member to investigate certain charges. The first resolution of the meeting required him to do that. The district member said he knew of no portion of the constitution which was violated by an act of that kind, and he knew of no section of the constitution which would enable him to inflict a penalty. That letter of Beggs' when you study it, means this: 'I do not want to do this, I would rather have nothing to do with it, but I have been compelled to notice it, and these old quarrels must stop.' And you will notice it is full of forebodings of dangers to come.
"Again, subsequently, you will remember that Beggs replied at a subsequent meeting that the committee—the secret committee which he had appointed—must report to him alone. Then the practical part of the business began with the appointment of that committee. It was Beggs' duty to appoint that committee. Beggs did appoint that committee. Beggs was an enemy of Cronin, as were the others. Beggs denounced him as did the others. Beggs said after his death, 'O, he will turn up; he is all right.' The others said the same thing. They covered his body with the filth of the sewer and his memory with the epithet of traitor. I said in an American court, before an American jury, it made no difference whether the charges which Coughlin made were true or false, it made no difference whether he was a traitor or a patriot, but the truth of history demands that the name of Cronin shall be vindicated, and it is vindicated more strongly than it could be by mortal lips when you remember that that vindication comes from the slime of the sewer on his body and the production of his clothes, also from another sewer. They murdered him because they feared his charges; they called him a spy in order to nerve their dupes to kill him, and they slew him. Gentlemen of the jury, I have now said all in this case that I intend to say. It is needless for me to say more, as I shall be followed by others of great ability. I simply ask you to do this. Your duty is unpleasant, and the duties you have already undergone have been onerous and burdensome.
"It is unpleasant for a man to sit on the trial of a fellow-man on a charge involving his life and liberty, but it is your business to do that in this case. As long as human nature is constituted in such a way as it is, law will be necessary to make some men walk straight. Crimes, murders, thefts and arsons can only be prevented by the enforcement of the law. The law, as I said, can only be enforced by the jury. On the call of Providence you are here now, and your duty is before you. Recollect, gentlemen, that while your duty is serious and burdensome, it is also of vast importance. Remember, gentlemen, that your duty is just as important and as necessary, and the necessity for courage and determination to carry out that duty is as great as it would be upon the battlefield or in any other walk of life. Deal with these men justly, execute the law, satisfy your own consciences, and the rest of us will be satisfied."