Facing the chair

by John Dos Passos

Fitzgerald testified that Bullet No. 3 did not come from the Sacco gun; that there was no condition existent in that gun to cause the peculiar marking on the bullet.

Expert Burns fired U. S. bullets, for the reason that, as stated above, the “fatal” bullet was of an obsolete make, and he had found it impossible to secure an exact duplicate in spite of having made great effort to do so. He considered that the U. S. bullets which he used corresponded more nearly with the “fatal” bullet than did the newer make of Winchester used by Captain Van Amburgh.

To the minds of many who followed this gun testimony, the claim of the government regarding a certain gun seemed farcical. The fact that two of the bullets said to have been fired through the so-called Sacco gun did bear microscopic marks faintly resembling that on the “fatal bullet” seems to have carried weight with some members of the jury; that is indicated by the circumstance that the microscope was called for while the verdict was under consideration. The question was so involved, the chances of error so great, the opinion of experts so conflicting, that it would seem as if a layman could hardly have made a final judgment on the matter.

Then came up the testimony about Sacco’s reputation.

From 1910 to 1917 he worked in the Milford Shoe Factory. The foreman during four years of this time, John J. Millick, a responsible looking person of the English operative type, testified of Sacco, “a steady workman, never lost a day.” Asked as to his reputation as a peaceful and law-abiding citizen, he answered “good.”

Michael F. Kelley, the senior partner in the Three K Factory at Stoughton where Sacco was employed the 18 months previous to his arrest, and his son George Kelley, superintendent and part owner, bore testimony as to Sacco’s character similar to that of Mr. Millick.

Both of the Kelleys gave testimony which dovetailed in with that of others in establishing Sacco’s alibi. Late in March, Sacco had told both Michael and George Kelley that he had received letters from Italy announcing his mother’s death, and that he must go home as soon as possible to see his father. With George Kelley he had arranged to break in another man to do his work and that he should be free to start for Italy as soon as his place was satisfactorily filled.

On Monday or Tuesday of the week of April 15th, Sacco told George Kelley he would like a day off that week, to make a trip to Boston and get the passport. On Wednesday, April 14th, Sacco told him that he was well ahead of his work and would go to Boston the following day. He was absent the following day, Thursday, April 15th (the fateful day of the South Braintree murder), in Boston; so Sacco claimed and so George Kelley believed. The day following that, April 16th, Sacco was at work at the usual hour. This day, the 15th of April, was the only day of absence which George Kelley recalled. And he believed he would have remembered had Sacco been absent on any other day as his was “a one-man job,” and if “he was out, the work was blocked.”

It was not controverted that Sacco had been to Boston about his passport at approximately the date he claimed. Whether he had really gone to Boston on April 15th as he claimed, or to South Braintree to commit murder as the Government claimed, was the issue of the trial. Ten witnesses supported the alibi. The truthfulness of their testimony was not impeached, although efforts were made to impeach the reliability of their memory. However, it appears that they certainly saw Sacco in various parts of Boston some day that week. And since Thursday was the only day it was shown that Sacco was not at work, the conclusion is obvious.

Mrs. Sacco, when upon the witness stand, unwittingly to herself buttressed her husband’s alibi claim. She fixed the date he had gone for the passport by the visit she received from a friend who had come with his wife from Milford the day her husband was absent, and who had stayed to dinner. The friend she said was Enrico Iacovelli whom her husband had sent for to see Mr. Kelley and arrange to be broken into Sacco’s work.