“Q. Don’t you know he is a detective of the Southern Pacific? A. I don’t know anything about the gentleman.”
The Call, in its issue of September 26, 1907, stated in explanation of how the graft defense had come by the statement Lonergan had made to Dorland that: “After court adjourned (September 25) Attorney Rogers offered an explanation for Walter Dorland, the man who was charged by the prosecution with having attempted to kidnap Lonergan. Rogers’s story differed from that told by Dorland. Rogers stated that Dorland was not a detective, but was in charge of a hospital in Chicago. He came to San Francisco, where he met Luther Brown, an associate of Rogers. Brown and Dorland were old friends and the former induced Dorland to get statements from the Supervisors for him. Dorland did this. Rogers says he has statements from all the Supervisors with the exception of Gallagher.”
Heney states in an affidavit filed in the case of The People vs. Patrick Calhoun et als., No. 823, that he had been informed that the reason given by Ruef for securing the signatures of the Supervisors to this affidavit was to find out which, if any of them, had confessed, upon the theory that any one of them who had confessed would refuse to sign an affidavit, and upon the further theory that if such a confessing member did sign the affidavit, he would thus be making a contradictory statement under oath, which could thus be further used against him by Ruef or Gallagher, upon the trial of either of them.
But whatever Ruef’s far-seeing motive, this affidavit which he, through Keane, induced the Supervisors to sign, was used by the attorneys for the defense at the graft trials to show contradictory statements of the confessing Supervisors.
The San Francisco Call, in its issue of September 25, 1907, in commenting on Lonergan’s testimony, says: “While Lonergan’s narrative tells a portion of the story, it is not all. In another automobile were Detective Luther Brown and the ‘Banjo-Eyed Kid’ of the United Railroads. They followed close on the heels of the auto occupied by Detective Dorland. Both machines sped to a resort near the park, where a meeting place had been arranged and where Lonergan was to be turned over to the custody of the ‘Banjo-Eyed Kid.’ The rest was to be left to the Kid. If the plan had carried there would have been no Lonergan at the trial yesterday, the defense would have flashed the statement secured by Dorland and set up the cry that the entire prosecution of the United Railroads was a plot set on foot by Rudolph Spreckels.”
Several who participated in this affair were later indicted for kidnaping. There were no convictions.