It is a cool spring morning, and the small crowd which daily gathers to watch the arrival of the prisoners in their black-covered wagons has dispersed; the guard of infantry has marched back to the Rocca, once the castle of the popes and now a barracks; and only a couple of carabinieri stand before the door, their white-gloved hands clasped before their belts. Inside, in the extreme rear of the church, you find yourself in a small inclosure seating a couple of hundred people, and a foot or so lower than the level of the rest of the building. This is full of visitors from Rome, wives of lawyers, townspeople, and a scattering of English and American motorists. A rail separates this—the only provision for spectators—from the real court. (At the Thaw and Patterson trials the guests of the participants and officials swarmed all over the court-room, around and beside the jury-box, inside the rail at which the prisoners were seated, and occasionally even shared the dais with the judge.)
We will assume that the proceedings have not yet begun, and that the advocates in their black gowns are chatting among themselves or conferring with their clients through the bars of the cage, which is built into the right-hand side of the church and completely fills it. This cage, by the way, is an absolute necessity where large numbers of prisoners are tried together. The custom of isolating the defendant in some such fashion is not peculiar to Italy, but is in use in our own country as well; and if one attends a criminal trial in the city of Boston he will see the accused elevated in a kind of temporary cell in the middle of the court-room, and looking as if he were suspended in a sort of human bird-cage. Where, as in most jurisdictions of the United States, every defendant can demand a separate trial as of right (which he almost inevitably does demand), no inconvenience is to be anticipated from allowing him his temporary freedom while in the court-room in the custody of an officer. But there are many cases, where three or more defendants are tried together, when, even in New York City, there is considerable danger that the prisoners may seek the opportunity to carry out a vendetta against the witnesses or to revenge themselves upon judge or prosecutor. There is much to be said in favor of isolating defendants in some such way, particularly where they are on trial for atrocious crimes or are likely to prove insane. The Camorrists at Viterbo have already been incarcerated for over four years—one of them died in prison—and were they accessible in the court-room to their relatives or criminal associates and could thus procure fire-arms or knives, there is no prophesying what the result might be to themselves or others. Certain it is that the chief witness, the informer Abbatemaggio, would have met a speedy death before any of his testimony had been given.
On the opposite or left side of the church, in an elevated box, sit the jury, who keep their hats on throughout the proceedings. They are respectable-looking citizens, rather more prepossessing than one of our own petit juries and slightly less so than twelve men drawn from one of the New York City special panels. At the end or apex of the church is a curved bench or dais with five seats. In the middle, under the dome, are four rows of desks, with chairs, at which sit the advocates, one or more for each prisoner. The only gallery, which is above and behind the jury-box, is given over to the press. At all the doors and the ends of the aisles, at each side of the judges’ dais, and in front of the prisoners’ cage stand carabinieri, in their picturesque uniforms and cocked hats with red and blue cockades, and a captain of carabinieri stands beside each witness as he gives his testimony. Thus the court, which is in the form of a cross, is naturally divided into four parts and a centre: in front the spectators, on the right the prisoners, on the left the jury, between them the lawyers, and at the end the judges and officers of the assize. A mellow light filters down from above, rather trying to the eyes.
The Camorrists, heavily shackled, are brought in from a side entrance, each in custody of two carabinieri, their chains are removed, the prisoners are thrust behind the bars, and the guards step to one side and remain crowded around and behind the cage during the session. In a separate steel cage sits Abbatemaggio, the informer, at an oblique distance of about five feet from the other prisoners. A guard stands between the two cages. If one meets a file of these prisoners in one of the corridors, he will be surprised, and perhaps embarrassed, to find that each, as he approaches, will raise his shackled hands to his head, remove his hat, and bow courteously, with a “Buon giorno” or “Buona sera.” While this may be one of the universal customs of a polite country, one cannot help feeling that it is partly due to an instinctive desire of the accused for recognition as human beings. All are scrupulously clean and dressed in the heights of Italian fashion. In fact, the Camorrists are much the best-dressed persons in the court-room, and the judicial officials, when off duty and in fustian, look a shade shabby by contrast. The funds of the Camorrists seem adequate both for obtaining witnesses and retaining lawyers; and the difference between one’s mental pictures of a lot of Neapolitan thieves and cutthroats and the apotheosized defendants on trial is at first somewhat startling. Looking at them across the court-room, they give the impression of being exceptionally intelligent and smartly dressed men—not unlike a section of the grandstand taken haphazard at a National League game. Closer scrutiny reveals the merciless lines in most of the faces, and the catlike shiftiness of the eyes.
As for the lawyers,—the avvocati,—they seem very much like any group of American civil lawyers and distinctly superior to the practitioners in our criminal courts. Many are young and hope to win their spurs in this celebrated case. Others are old warhorses whose fortunes are tied up with those of the Camorra. At least one such, Avvocato Lioy, is of necessity giving his services for nothing. But it is when the avvocato rises to address the court that the distinction between him and his American brother becomes obvious; for he is an expert speaker, trained in diction, enunciation, and delivery, and rarely in our own country (save on the stage or in the pulpit) will one hear such uniform fluency and eloquence. Nor is the speech of the advocate less convincing for its excellence, for these young men put a fire and zeal into what they say that compel attention.
Now, if the prisoners are all seated, the captain of carabinieri raps upon the floor with his scabbard, and the occupants of the room, prisoners, advocates, jury, and spectators, rise as the president, vice-president, prosecutor, vice-prosecutor, and cancelliere enter in their robes. The president makes a bow, the others bow a little, the lawyers bow, and everybody sits down—that is to say, everybody who has arisen; for Don Ciro Vitozzi and “Professor” Rapi, who sit outside and in front of the cage (the “professor” has already been confined longer than any term to which he could be sentenced, and both have pleaded sickness as an excuse for leniency), make a point of showing their superiority to the vulgar herd by waiting until the last moment and then giving a partial but ineffectual motion as if to stand.
The five men upon the dais are, however, worthy of considerable attention. The president, who occupies the centre seat, is a stout, heavily built, “stocky” man with a brownish-gray beard. In his robes he is an imposing and dignified figure, in spite of his lack of height. All wear gowns with red and gold braid and tassels, and little round caps with red “topknots” and gold bands. This last ornament is omitted from the uniform of the cancelliere, who is the official scribe or recorder of the court. And just here is noticeable a feature which tends to accelerate the proceedings, for there are no shorthand minutes of the testimony, and only a rough digest of what goes on is made. This is, for the most part, dictated by the president, under the correction of the advocates and the officers of the court, who courteously interrupt if the record appears to them inaccurate. If they raise no objection the record stands as given. Thus thousands of pages of generally useless matter are done away with, and the record remains more like the “notes” of a careful and painstaking English judge. Any particular bit of testimony or the gist of it can usually be found very quickly, without (as in our own courts of law) the stenographer having to wade through hundreds of pages of questions and answers before the matter wanted can be unearthed, buried, like as not, under an avalanche of objections, exceptions, wrangles of counsel, and irrelevant or “stricken out” testimony.
At the left of the semicircle sits the acting procuratore del re—another small man who, on the bench, makes a wonderfully dignified impression. He plays almost as important a part in the proceedings as the president himself, and is treated with almost equal consideration. This is Cavaliere Santaro, one of the most learned and eloquent lawyers in Italy. To hear him argue a point in his crisp, clean-cut, melodious voice is to realize how far superior Italian public speaking is to the kind of oratory prevalent in our courts, and national legislature, and on most public occasions throughout the United States. Beside both the president and the procuratore del re sits a “vice,” or assistant, to each, to take his place when absent and to act as associate at other times. The cancelliere occupies the seat upon the right nearest the prisoners’ cage.
The president having taken his place, the first order of the day is the reading or revision of all or part of the record of the preceding session. This is done by the cancelliere who, from time to time, is interrupted by the lawyers, Abbatemaggio, or the prisoners. These interruptions are usually to the point, and are quickly disposed of by the judge, although he may allow an argument thereon at some length from one of the advocates. The court then proceeds with the introduction of evidence, documentary or otherwise, the examination of the witnesses, or the confronting of the prisoners with their accusers. Now is immediately observable for the first time the characteristic of Italian criminal procedure which has been so much misrepresented and has been the cause of such adverse criticism in the United States and England—namely, the constant interruption of the proceedings by argument or comment from the lawyers, and by remarks and contradictions from the prisoners and witnesses. These occasionally degenerate into altercations of a more or less personal nature; but they are generally stilled at a single word of caution from the judge, and serve to bring out and accentuate the different points at issue and to make clear the position of the different parties. When such interruptions occur, the proceedings ordinarily resemble a joint discussion going on among a fairly large gathering of people presided over by a skilful moderator.
A witness is testifying. In the middle of it (and “it” consists of not only what the witness has seen, but what he has been told and believes) one of the prisoners rises and cries out: