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The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 11

Published on February 18, 2014 by Tanstaafl in Age of Treason Radio

Concluding this series with some final thoughts on Slaton’s commutation letter (see also Carlos Porter’s transcription), and the closing arguments in Leo Frank’s trial.

There is a noticable shift in Slaton’s attitude as his letter progresses. THE STATE’S CASE, from which selections were read the last time, reviews the most prominent evidence against Frank which didn’t involve Jim Conley: Monteen Stover, the Frank housekeeper (Minola McKnight) and her husband, and Frank’s mishandling of Newt Lee’s time slip. The section labelled JIM CONLEY, which comes next, notes the key role played by Conley, and is where Slaton’s tone turns noticably more skeptical and doubtful.

The most startling and spectacular evidence in the case was that given by a negro, Jim Conley, a man 27 years of age, and one who frequently had been in the chain gang.

Slaton adds here another reason to suspect Frank:

Frank put his character in issue and the State introduced ten witnesses attacking Frank’s character, some of whom were Factory employees, who testified that Frank’s reputation for lasciviousness was bad and some told that he had been making advances to Mary Phagan, whom Frank had professed to the Detectives, either not to have known, or to have been slightly acquainted with. Other witnesses testified that Frank had improperly gone into the Dressing Room of the girls. Some witnesses who answered on direct examination that Frank’s reputation for lasciviousness was bad, were not cross-examined as to details, and this was made the subject of comment before the Jury.

The above states very briefly the gist of the State’s case, omitting many incidents which the State claims would confirm Frank’s guilt when taken in their entirety.

Next comes a section titled DEFENSE, in which Slaton lays out his doubts, almost all of which are related to Conley. Contra Porter, Slaton and the other legal minds involved in the case were well aware of the limitations on an accessory’s testimony:

Wherever a physical fact is stated by Conley, which is admitted, this can be accepted, but under both the rules of law and common sense, his statements cannot be received, excepting where clearly corroborated. He admits not only his participation as an accessory, but also glibly confesses his own infamy.

Slaton considered it likely that Conley lied about Frank dictating the notes and lied about where they were written.

AUTHOR OF THE NOTES

Conley admits he wrote the notes found by the body of Mary Phagan. Did Frank dictate them? Conley swears he did. The State says that the use of the word “did” instead of “done” indicates a white man’s dictation. Conley admits the spelling was his. The words are repeated and are simple, which characterizes Conley’s letters. In Conley’s testimony, you will find frequently that he uses the word “did” and according to calculation submitted to me, he used the word “did” over fifty times during the trial.

While Conley was in jail charged with being an accessory, there was also incarcerated in the jail, a woman named Annie Maude Carter, whom Conley had met at the Court House. She did some work in the jail and formed the acquaintance of Conley, who wrote to her many lengthy letters. These letters are the most obscene and lecherous I have ever read. In these letters, the word “did’ is frequently employed. It will be observed that in Conley’s testimony, he uses frequently the word “negro”, and in the Annie Maude Carter notes, he says, “I have a negro watching you”.

The Annie Maude Carter notes, which were powerful evidence in behalf of the defendant, and which tended strongly to show that Conley was the real author of the murder notes, were not before the jury [underlined in pen in the original].

Though they didn’t know about the Carter notes, is it reasonable to assume that the jury didn’t actually consider that Conley might be lying on this point anyway?

WHERE WERE THE NOTES WRITTEN

This evidence was never passed upon by the jury and developed since the trial. It was strongly corroborative of the theory of the defense that the death notes were written, not in Frank’s office, but in the basement, and especially in view of the evidence of Police Seargeant Dobbs, who visited the scene of the crime Sunday morning, as follows:

“This scratch pad was also lying on the ground close to the body. The scratch pad was lying near the notes. They were all right close together. There was a pile of trash near the boiler where this note was found, and paper and pencil were down there too”.

This is evidence that Conley decided where to write the notes and what to put in them. Did the jury convict Frank because they mistakely thought he dictated those notes, or did they realize Conley was a liar, could very well have been lying about these aspects of the notes, and convict Frank anyway because of the gist of the prosecution’s argument still fit best?

The evidence shows that Conley was as depraved and lecherous a negro as ever lived in the state of Georgia. He lay in watch and described the clothes and stockings of the women who went to the Factory.

His story necessarily bears the construction that Frank had an engagement with Mary Phagan which no evidence in the case would justify. If Frank had engaged Conley to watch for him, it could only have been for Mary Phagan, since he made no improper suggestion to any other female on that day, and it was undisputed that many did come up prior to 12.00 o’clock, and whom could Frank have been expecting except Mary Phagan under Conley’s story. This view cannot be entertained, as an unjustifiable reflection on the young girl.

Why the negro wrote the notes is a matter open to conjecture. He had been drinking heavily that morning, and it is possible that he undertook to describe the other negro in the building so that it would avert suspicions.

It may yet be possible that his version is correct.

The testimony discloses that he was in the habit of allowing men to go into the basement for immoral purposes for a consideration, and when Mary Phagan passed by him close to the hatchway leading into the basement and in the gloom and darkness of the entrance, [handwritten insertion: Mary? ???] he attacked her. What is the truth we may never know.

Slaton put his conclusion in a section titled JUDICIARY. He commuted Frank’s sentence based on a technicality – he purported a procedural mistake had been made in the original trial – that the judge had thought he must sentence Frank to death if the verdict was guilty. So, based on doubts Slaton thought the judge should have had, which in turn were based on evidence which Slaton himself emphasized was not known to the judge or jury at the time, Slaton changed Frank’s sentence:

Under our statute, in cases of conviction of murder on circumstantial evidence, it is within the discretion of the trial judge to sentence the defendant to life imprisonment (Code Section 63).

The conviction of Frank was on circumstantial evidence, as the Solicitor General admits in his written argument.

Judge Roan, however, misconstrued his power, as evidence by the following charge to the jury in the case of the State against Frank:

“If you believe beyond a reasonable doubt from the evidence in this case that this defendant is guilty of murder, then, you would be authorized in that event to say: ”We, the jury, find the defendant guilty”. Should you go further, gentlemen, and say nothing else in your verdict, the court would have to sentence the defendant to the extreme penalty of murder, to wit: “To be hanged by the neck until he is dead”.

Surely, if Judge Roan entertained the extreme doubt indicated by his statement and had remembered the power granted him by the Code, he would have sentenced the defendant to life imprisonment.

Slaton claimed the judge would have agreed with the change in sentence, but didn’t think the jury would have changed their verdict against Frank:

In the Frank case three matters have developed since the trial which did not come before the jury, to wit: the Carter notes, the testimony of Becker, indicating that the death notes were written in the basement, and the testimony of Dr. Harris, that he was under the impression that the hair on the lathe was not that of Mary Phagan, and thus tending to show that the crime was not committed on the floor of Frank’s office.

While made the subject of an extraordinary motion for a new trial, it is well known that it is almost a practical impossibility to have a verdict set aside by this procedure.

The evidence might not have changed the verdict, but it might have caused the jury to render a verdict with the recommendation of mercy.

In any event, the performance of my duty under the Constitution, is a matter of my conscience. The responsibility rests where the power is reposed. Judge Roan, with that awful sense of responsibility, which probably came over him as he thought of that Judge before whom he would shortly appear, calls to me from another world to request that I do that which he should have done. I can endure misconstruction, abuse and condemnation, but I cannot stand the constant companionship of an accusing conscience, which would remind me in every thought that I, as a Governor of Georgia, failed to do what I thought to be right. There is a territory “beyond a REASONABLE DOUBT and absolute certainty”, for which the law provides in allowing life imprisonment instead of execution. This case has been marked by doubt. The trial judge doubted. Two Judges of the Supreme Court of Georgia doubted. Two Judges of the Supreme Court of the United States doubted. One of the three Prision Commissioners doubted.

In my judgement, by granting a commutation in this case, I am sustaining the jury, the judge, and the appellate tribunals, and at the same time am discharging that duty which is placed on me by the Constitution of the State.

Acting, therefore, in accordance with what I believe to be my duty under the circumstances of this case, it is

ORDERED: That the sentence in the case of Leo M. Frank is commuted from the death penalty to imprisonment for life.

This 21st day of June, 1915.

An article from The Kansas City Star, DID LEO FRANK DICTATE THE MURDER NOTES?: AN ANALYSIS, dated 17 January 1915, is worth noting. It prefigured Slaton’s rationale for doubt, but used Porter-like terms (“absolute” “proof”) to proclaim Frank’s innocence:

Jim Conley, the negro, murdered Mary Phagan, and he described how he slew her in the two notes he wrote and laid beside her body.

Conley is a low, dissolute, brutal negro. He had been in jail different times. He lived with a negro woman not his wife. He drank heavily and was always trying to borrow money from the girls in the factory, where he was a roustabout. His brutal nature is shown by the glib, grinning manner in which he told of carrying the body of the murdered girl to the basement, dropping her with a “thump” upon the floor, handling the body of the pretty, golden haired girls as coldly as if it had been a dead dog.

He was drunk the day of the murder.

Conley’s bad character was well established during the trial. It reflects poorly on Frank, at whose discretion he was employed. Frank’s own questionable character, particularly a prior pattern of lasciviousness directly relevant to the nature of the crime he was on trial for, was also raised during the trial.

Now mark this, it is proof of Frank’s innocence, that pad had printed on the top of every sheet the name of the pencil company and a date. it was a pad used in the office by Superintendent Becker, who preceded Frank as the factory head. All of those pads were carried into the basement two years before, after Frank became superintendent, and ask had new pads printed. There was no paper in Frank’s office like that upon which that note was written. This disproves absolutely the story of the negro that the notes were written in Frank’s office.

Speculation that Conley lied about the how or where of the notes doesn’t “prove” any specific how or where, and certainly doesn’t “prove” that Conley was the murderer, or that Frank was innocent. Such extreme claims do however “prove” the irrational bias of the person who makes them.

Conley’s propensity for lying was openly discussed and acknowledged during the trial. Conley may very well have lied about who conceived the notes and where they were written. This is not a new consideration, nor does it significantly alter the prosecution’s argument, based on other evidence, that Frank was the murderer and Conley, who was Frank’s helper before the murder, was enlisted by Frank to help him afterward.

The negro’s story is so incredible, so absurd, so inconsistent with all the facts, that one wonders that anyone could believe a word of it.

This evaluation of Conley is in direct contrast with Slaton, who reviewed the same facts and had the same dim view of Conley’s character, but came to the opposite conclusion about Conley’s credibility:

It is hard to conceive that any man’s power of fabrication of minute details could reach that which Conley showed, unless it be the truth.

I’ll conclude my own evaluation with a few excerpts and comments on the closing arguments of the attorneys who argued the case.

The following excerpts have been taken from The Leo Frank Trial: Closing Arguments of Hooper, Arnold, and Rosser, by Bradford L. Huie, The American Mercury.

Frank Hooper (prosecution):

You will notice that the defense has pitched its every effort entirely on [James] Jim Conley. I don’t blame them. He was like Stone Mountain is to some highways in its vicinity. They couldn’t get by him. We could have left him out and have had an excellent chain of circumstantial evidence.

All they could say was that Jim had been a big liar. That is true.

Reuben Arnold (defense):

He’s the same sort of a man who believes that there ought to be a hanging because that innocent little girl was murdered, and who would like to see this Jew here hang because somebody ought to hang for it. I’ll tell you right now, if Frank hadn’t been a Jew there would never have been any prosecution against him.

I’m asking my own people to turn him loose, asking them to do justice to a Jew, and I’m not a Jew, but I would rather die before doing injustice to a Jew. This case has just been built up by degrees; they have a monstrous perjurer here in the form of this Jim Conley against Frank. You know what sort of a man Conley is, and you know that up to the time the murder was committed no one ever heard a word against Frank.

In circumstantial cases you can’t convict a man as long as there’s any other possible theory for the crime of which he is accused, and you can’t find Frank guilty if there’s a chance that Conley is the murderer. The state has nothing on which to base their case but Conley, and we’ve shown Conley a liar.

Luther Rosser (defense):

There are several things I don’t understand about this case, and never will. Why old man Lee didn’t find the body sooner; why he found it lying on its face ; how he saw it from a place he could not have seen it from.

I was raised with niggers and know something about them. I do not know them as well as the police, perhaps, for they know them like no one else. But I know something about them. There must have been a nigger in the crime who knew about it before Newt or anyone else. I am afraid Newt knew.

The thing that arises in this case to fatigue my indignation is that men born of such parents should believe the statement of Conley against the statement of Frank. Who is Conley? Who was Conley as he used to be and as you have seen him? He was a dirty, filthy, black, drunken, lying nigger. Black knows that. Starnes knows that. Chief Beavers knows it.

Who was it that made this dirty nigger come up here looking so slick? Why didn’t they let you see him as he was? They shaved him, washed him and dressed him up.

Cut out Conley and you strip the case to nothing. Did you hear the way Conley told his story? Have you ever heard an actor, who knew his Shakespearean plays, his “Merchant of Venice” or his “Hamlet”? He can wake up at any time of the night and say those lines, but he can’t say any lines of a play he has never learned. So it was with Conley. He could tell the story of the disposition of the girl’s body, and he knew it so well he could reel it off backward or forward, any old way, but when you got to asking him about other things, he always had one phrase, “Boss, ah can’t ‘member dat.”

Was it fair for two skilled white men to train that negro by the hour and by the day and to teach him and then get a statement from him and call it the truth? Well, Professors Black and Scott finished with him, and they thought Conley’s education was through, but that nigger had to have a university course!

Scott, you and Black milked him dry; you thought you did, anyhow, but you got no moral perversion and no watching. In the university they gave a slightly different course. It was given by Professors Starnes and Campbell. Oh, I wish I could look as pious as Starnes does. And Professor Dorsey helped out, I suppose. I don’t know what Professor Dorsey did, only he gave him several lessons, and they must have been just sort of finishing touches before he got his degree. Well, in the university course they didn’t dare put the steps in writing, as they had done in the high school; it would have been too easy to trace from step to step, the suggestions made, the additions and subtractions here and there. Professor Dorsey had him seven times, I know that, but God alone knows how many times the detectives had him.

Was it fair to take this weak, pliable negro and have these white men teach him, one after another? Who knows what is the final story that Conley will tell? He added the mesh bag when he was on the stand.

In comparison to the others, the closing argument of Hugh Dorsey (prosecution) was very long. It is available online at Arguments of Hugh M. Dorsey in the Leo Frank Murder Trial, at archive.org.

They have maligned and abused me; they have abused the detectives; they have heaped calumny on us to such an extent that that good lady, the mother of this defendant, was so wrought up that she arose* and in this presence denounced me as a dog.

Prejudice and Perjury! Gentlemen, do you think that I, or that these detectives are actuated by prejudice? Would we as sworn officers of the law have sought to hang this man on account of his race and religion, and passed up Jim Conley, a negro? Prejudice! Prejudiced, when they arrested Gantt and released him? Prejudiced, when they had Newt Lee? No. But when you get Frank, then you have got prejudice at the same time.

Defense First Mentioned Race.

Now let’s see about this thing. These gentlemen were disappointed because this case wasn’t pitched on that theory. Not a word emanated from this side, not a word indicating any feeling against, any prejudice against, any human being, black or White, jew or Gentile. We didn’t feel it, we would despise ourselves if we had appeared in this presence and asked you to render a verdict against any man, black or White, jew or Gentile, on account of prejudice. But, ah! the first time it was ever brought into this case, — and it was brought in for a purpose, and I have never seen any two men manifest more delight or exultation than Messrs. Rosser and Arnold, when they put the questions to George Kendley at the eleventh hour. A thing they had expected us to do and which the State did not do because we didn’t feel it and because it wasn’t in this case. I will never forget how they seized it, seized with avidity the suggestion, and you know how they have harped on it ever since. Now, mark you, they are the ones that mentioned it, not us; the word never escaped our mouth.

Tribute to Jewish Race.

I say to you here and now that the race from which that man comes is as good as our race. His ancestors were civilized when ours were cutting each other up and eating human flesh; his race is just as good as ours, — just so good but no better. – I honor the race that has produced a D’Israeli, — the greatest Prime Minister that England has ever produced; I honor the race that produced Judah P. Benjamin, — as great a lawyer as ever lived in America or England, because he lived in both places and won renown in both places. I honor the Strauss brothers, — Oscar, the diplomat, and the man who went down with his wife by his side on the Titanic. I roomed with one of his race at college; one of his race is my partner, I served with old man Joe Hirsch on the Board of Trustees of the Grady Hospital. I know Rabbi Marx but to honor him, and I know Doctor Sonn, of the Hebrew Orphans’ Home, and I have listened to him with pleasure and pride.

But, on the other hand, when Becker wished to put to death his bitter enemy, it was men of Frank’s race he selected. Abe Hummel, the lawyer, who went to the penitentiary in New York, and Abe Keuf, who went to the penitentiary in San Francisco; Schwartz, the man accused of stabbing a girl in New York, who committed suicide, and others that I could mention, show that this great people are amenable to the same laws as you and I and the black race. They rise to heights sublime, but they sink to the depths of degradation.

The two overarching explanations of this case were fleshed out, debated and decided on a hundred years ago. Either Frank murdered Phagan, and to defend himself he tried, among other things, to frame Newt Lee and then Jim Conley. Or Conley murdered Phagan, and framed Frank, with the aid of the police, the private detective Frank hired, the prosecutors and all twelve men on the jury.

After looking into the details of the case I agree with the decision the jury arrived at. The evidence and argument that Frank murdered Mary Phagan has more merit than any other explanation. It not only better fits the evidence, but better explains why the prosecution proceeded as they did, and the jury decided as they did, in spite of Jim Conley’s bad character.

That Conley was a depraved lecherous brutal lying negro “as ever lived in the state of Georgia” does not imply Frank could not have been the murderer. Why does anyone argue as if it does? Because they have no better argument to make.

Slaton tried to save Frank’s life. He didn’t argue against Frank’s guilt.

The jewish narrative has always been that Frank was innocent, “falsely accused, wrongly convicted, wantonly murdered”. In fact Frank was rightly accused, convincingly convicted, and justly punished. Despite extraordinary efforts to thwart it, the sentence which was very deliberately considered and handed down was correctly carried out in the end.

Leo Frank, and those who defend him, should never be forgiven. Mary Phagan, the girl whose life was cut short, should never be forgotten.

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The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 10

Published on February 11, 2014 by Tanstaafl in Age of Treason Radio

More on Carlos Porter’s argument, as expressed in LETTER 29 FROM CHICAGO DAVE: SKUNKIE AND THE LEO FRANK FILE:

In most ways, the commutation file is the best.

Read the files, OK, there are 29 of them, but there’s not much text on each page. [Note: I transcribed them.]

Porter’s conclusion:

The circumstantial evidence, in my mind, is inconclusive; so is the character evidence. If Frank had been convicted on circumstantial evidence alone, the case would be unclear. The evidence provided by Conley — particularly, the death notes — proves, in my view, that Frank’s guilt is not only out of the question, but absolutely impossible.

That’s the way I feel today, and I’ve felt that way for 30 years.

Porter has left some comments on Part 9. Much of it taken from LETTER 29. This snippet, for example, relates the portion of his argument which he says anticipated mine:

Frank cannot have dictated those notes. At most he could have said, “Hey Jim, why don’t you write a couple of notes and pretend you’re the girl and say a tall slim negro did it, since you’re short and stocky”? “OK Boss”. What would be the point to that? Why would Conley agree to do that — for any amount of money? As soon as the word got out that Conley wrote the notes, it would logically be assumed (under normal circumstances) that Conley committed the murder, and his life wouldn’t be worth a plugged nickel. Unless they believed him. The notes would lead the cops to Conley and Conley would accuse Frank, which is exactly what happened according to the people who think Frank was guilty.

Porter seems not only unwilling to think of an answer, but unable to accept that one has been provided.

The point of Frank requesting Conley write something would have been to direct suspicion away from himself. He may have hoped to cloud the investigation and create exactly the kind of doubt and confusion Porter and others have used to argue in favor of Frank’s innocence.

Porter implies that dumb drunkard Conley would have known that the police could match his handwriting and connect the notes back to him. Porter is unwilling to imagine however that clever quick-witted Frank could have seen any benefit to himself.

It’s not difficult to imagine how either man could have seen value in producing those notes. Frank in a smart and direct way, by getting someone else implicated, and Conley in a relatively stupid way, by helping his boss in order to indirectly help himself. When Conley wrote the notes he was mindful enough to implicate someone else. He was apparently just as mindful when he later lied about being unable to write, and still later when he claimed that Frank had dictated the notes, which very well could have been a lie.

As soon as the word got out that Conley wrote the notes, it would logically be assumed (under normal circumstances) that Conley committed the murder, and his life wouldn’t be worth a plugged nickel. Unless they believed him. The notes would lead the cops to Conley and Conley would accuse Frank, which is exactly what happened according to the people who think Frank was guilty. If you committed a murder you’d leave the body alone, you’d know any note would be linked to the killer.

If it weren’t for the notes it is quite probable that no one would have realized that Conley was even in the factory that day.

People who believe Frank was guilty do not like to discuss the notes in any detail, because logically they prove that Frank was innocent.

To sum up:

There were 2 notes, only one of which mentions the “night wich”. Even if “night wich” means “night watch”, instead of “night witch”, a common element of African folklore, a clear distinction is still made between the “night wich” and the “long, tall negro black”. They are clearly 2 different entities or people. The same note says the “night wich” didn’t do it. What is the sense of that? There were 2 notes, only one of which mentions the “night wich”. Why write 2?

A Negro would automatically be suspected of the crime. What difference would it make to Frank which one?

How would the notes implicate Newt Lee, the night watchman, if they were in Conley’s handwriting? The notes led the police to Conley, who led the police to Frank. Anyone could have predicted this. Or did Frank think the police would think they were written by the victim during the act of rape? “I wright while play with me”. What is the sense of that?

Indeed, there is little sense in this series of rhetorical questions. Porter’s jumble of points is based largely on overlooking or even inverting the reality that Frank was smart and Conley was not. It seems designed to create confusion rather than offer any sensible resolution to the apparent conflicts he brings up.

The fact that the notes are full of nonsense is an indication that they were conceived by the same simpleton who admitted writing them. If Conley lied about Frank dictating the notes, then that is an indication only that the simpleton preferred Frank be convicted of murder rather than himself.

Slaton was a politician and the file contains a lot of double-talk, for the simple reason that he didn’t want to make his constituents any madder then necessary. As it was, he had to call out the National Guard; for four nights, the woods behind his house was full of armed men trying to break into the house

The first portion of Slaton’s letter seems to be a fair enough description of the facts of the case, not double-talk.

The webmaster of the LeoFrank.org site spent about six weeks arguing with me about the case and about those notes in particular. At one point, he admitted to me that “those notes are an absurdity”. I pounced immediately, and said, “so, you admit that you believe in an absurdity?”

You know what he did? He changed the subject. This is what people ALWAYS do when you mention those notes. They run away. That is why I concentrate on them. I asked a question. I want an answer.

Porter also believes in an absurdity. He believe these absurd notes “prove” Frank’s innocence.

I can guess how the exchange with the webmaster of leofrank.org went. For six weeks Porter asked his rhetorical questions, answers were provided, and Porter ignored them.

It is well worth reviewing Governor John Slaton’s commutation letter, not only because Carlos Porter attests to its value, but because it provides a relatively concise and contemporary description of the thinking around the case. By it’s very nature Slaton’s argument was biased in favor of Frank, but his view still comes across as relatively objective, logical and reasonable.

Porter has emphasized select portions of Slaton’s text in his transcription, but it is still somewhat easier to read (not to mention copy and paste from) than the scans of the typewritten original.

Slaton wrote:

RACIAL PREJUDICE

The charge against the State of Georgia of racial prejudice is unfair. A conspicuous Jewish family in Georgia is descended from one of the original colonial families of the State. Jews have been presidents of our Boards of Education, principals of our schools, Mayors of our cities, and conspicuous in all our commercial enterprises.

THE FACTS IN THE CASE

Many newspapers and non-residents have declared that Frank was convicted without any evidence to sustain the verdict. In large measure, those giving expression to this utterance have not read the evidence and are not acquainted with the facts. The same may be said regarding many of those who demanding his execution.

In my judgement, no one has a right to an opinion who is not acquainted with the evidence in the case, and it must be conceded that those who saw the witnesses and beheld their demeanor upon the stand are in the best position as a general rule to reach the truth.

I cannot, within the short time given me to decide the case, enter into the details outlined in thousands of pages of testimony. I will present the more salient features, and have a right to ask that all persons who are interested in the determination of the matter, shall read calmly and dispassionately the facts.

Slaton reviewed several significant details of the case which indicated Frank’s guilt and had nothing to do with Jim Conley. Here he discusses the claims made by Minola McKnight, Frank’s mishandling of Newt Lee’s time slip, and the testimony of Monteen Stover:

The cook’s husband testified that on Saturday, the day of the murder, he visited his wife at the home of Mr. Selig, defendant’s father-in-law, where Frank and his wife were living, and that Frank came in to dinner and ate nothing. The negro cook of the Selig’s was placed upon the stand and denied that her husband was in the kitchen at all on that day. For purposes of impeachment, therefore, the State introduced an affidavit from this cook that on Sunday morning after the murder, she heard Mrs. Frank tell her mother that Mr. Frank was drinking the night before and made her sleep on a rug and called for a pistol to shoot himself, because he (Frank) had murdered a girl. This affidavit was relevant for purposes of impeachment, although, of course, it had no legal probative value as to the facts contained therein. On the stand, the cook declared that she was coerced by her husband and Detectives under threat of being locked up unless she gave it, and it was made at the Station House. The State proved it was given in the presence of a lawyer and said that her denial of the truth of the affidavit was because her wages had been increased by the parent of Mrs. Frank. No details are given as to where the conversation occurred between Mrs. Frank and her Mother, nor is there any explanation as to how she happened to hear the conversation. It will be easily seen that the effect of the affidavit upon the jury might be great.

It is hard to conceive that any man’s power of fabrication of minute details could reach that which Conley showed, unless it be the truth.

The evidence introduced tended to show that on Sunday morning Frank took out of the Time Clock the slip which he had admitted at that time was punched for each half hour, and subsequently Frank claimed that some punches had been missed. The suggestion was that he had either manipulated the slip to place the burden on Lee, or was so excited as to be unable to read the slip correctly.

The State introduced a witness, Monteen Stover, to prove that at the time when Mary Phagan and Frank were in the Metal Room, she was in Frank’s Office and he was absent, although he had declared he had not left his office.

I have not enumerated all the suspicious circumstances urged by the State, but have mentioned what have appeared to me the most prominent ones. Where I have not mentioned the more prominent ones, an inspection of record tends to maintain the contention.

The the jury and several judges decided unanimously that the circumstantial and character evidence was conclusive, beyond a reasonable doubt. Slaton speculated that Frank did not dictate the notes. He did not argue that this, together with everything else he considered, “proved” Frank’s guilt was “absolutely impossible”. That is Porter’s ridiculous leap. Slaton saw and described only enough doubt in Frank’s guilt to justify the legal technicality he used to alter Frank’s punishment.

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The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 9

Published on February 4, 2014 by Tanstaafl in Age of Treason Radio

The testimony of Jim Conley, the negro sweeper at the National Pencil Company, was a major portion of the second and third weeks of the Leo Frank trial. Cross-examination alone amounted to some 13 hours.

Returning to the Conley-related points in 100 Reasons Leo Frank Is Guilty, The American Mercury, by Bradford L. Huie:

55. Much is made by Frank partisans of Georgia Governor Slaton’s 1915 decision to commute Frank’s sentence from death by hanging to life imprisonment. But when Slaton issued his commutation order, he specifically stated that he was sustaining Frank’s conviction and the guilty verdict of the judge and jury: “In my judgement, by granting a commutation in this case, I am sustaining the jury, the judge, and the appellate tribunals, and at the same time am discharging that duty which is placed on me by the Constitution of the State.” He also added, of Jim Conley’s testimony that Frank had admitted to killing Mary Phagan and enlisted Conley’s help in moving the body: “It is hard to conceive that any man’s power of fabrication of minute details could reach that which Conley showed, unless it be the truth.”

The following points get at Frank and Conley’s special relationship before the murder:

81. The relationship of Leo Frank and the National Pencil Company to Jim Conley was a strange one. Why was Jim Conley’s sweeper’s salary much higher — $6.05 versus $4.05 — than the average of the white employees, many of whom were skilled machine operators? Could it be that Conley served a very important but secret purpose for Leo Frank, exactly as the prosecution alleged? Could he have had knowledge that could potentially hurt Leo Frank, justifying Frank granting him special privileges?

82. According to a female National Pencil Company employee, Jim Conley was once caught “sprinkling” (urinating) on the pencils, surely a very serious offense. But Conley was never fired. (Trial Testimony of Herbert George Schiff, Brief of Evidence, Leo Frank Trial, August, 1913) Again, could it be that James Conley served a very important but secret purpose for Leo Frank, and could he have possessed knowledge that could damage Frank?

83. According to fellow employee Gordon Bailey (Leo Frank trial, Brief of Evidence, August, 1913) Jim Conley was not always required to punch the time clock. Why would the “Negro sweeper,” as they called him, surely the lowest-ranking employee in the pencil factory hierarchy, be given such an unprecedented privilege by Leo M. Frank? Why was Jim Conley the only person out of the 170 factory employees who didn’t have to punch the time clock — unless Jim Conley was more than meets the eye?

The Leo Frank Trial: Week Two, The American Mercury, by Bradford L. Huie:

Prior to the trial, Jim Conley had made one admission after another under the withering blast of police interrogation. He would make three statements in all, in each one admitting to more and more participation in the crime. Despite his slow, reluctant, and grudging admissions — and the obvious contradictions among his initial affidavits — investigators, and even some who had been doubtful about Conley’s account, were finally convinced that they had gotten the truth out of him. Police and factory officials accompanied Conley when he was brought back to the scene of the crime. Conley guided them through the factory and recounted and re-enacted the events of April 26, 1913 — the day of the murder — step by step as he had experienced them. The account was so minute in its details, so consistent with the known facts, so precisely matched with evidence which Conley could not possibly have known about unless he had really been there, and presented in such an open and frank manner that even skeptics were convinced by it.

Conley’s own explanation:

As to why I didn’t tell it all, I didn’t want to tell it all. I was intending to hold back some. I didn’t want to tell it all right at one time. I just told a little and kept back a little. Yes, and Mr. Dorsey went down seven times while I was telling some and holding back some. They didn’t ask me to take back any stories. No, it didn’t take Mr. Dorsey seven times to tell the story. Yes, I said I added to it every time he went down. But he wouldn’t came back and try to do anything with it.

Frank’s defenders had their chance to question Conley, and the jury still found him credible:

Conley held up well under the ferocious attack of the defense. He freely admitted that he had been confused on a few occasions and had lied in his first two statements — first, to protect himself, and second to protect Frank, who he still expected would come up with bail money and get him out of town — and he also provided a wealth of new detail about Leo Frank’s “chats” with young women.

Frank’s defenders tried to play one group of goyim against another:

At one point, Frank’s attorney Luther Rosser, referring to the recent haircut and clean set of clothes that Conley had been given, snidely remarked “They put some new clothes on you so the jury could see you like a dressed-up nigger” — possibly inflaming racial feelings among the all-White jury. It was widely believed at the time that Conley would be disbelieved by many simply because he was black and because Leo Frank, a white man, and Frank’s attorneys would contradict Conley and accuse him of the murder — a woe be unto any black man in 1913 Atlanta accused of harming a white girl.

Nevertheless Conley, a simple and poorly educated man, gave not an inch on his most damaging claims against Frank even when the most skilled attorneys money could buy cross-questioned him for more than 13 hours.

The Leo Frank Trial: Week Three, The American Mercury, by Bradford L. Huie:

Herbert G. Schiff, the factory’s assistant superintendent directly under Leo Frank, then testified, stating that he’d never seen women brought to the office as the prosecution had alleged, nor had he seen Conley “watching” for Frank. He stated that he, not Frank, had paid off Helen Ferguson the Friday before the murder, and that Ferguson has not asked for Mary Phagan’s pay. He also went into excruciating detail — thousands of words’ worth — about how the books were kept at the factory, with the unstated implication being that Frank would have simply been too busy calculating sums and making entries to have entertained young ladies — or killed them. This “too busy” line of reasoning would be returned to again and again by the defense, and would form the larger part of Leo Frank’s own statement in his own defense. It was reinforced by the next witness, public accountant Joel Hunter, and yet another accountant, C.E. Pollard.

Several workers at the factory, testifying for the defense, said they’d never seen Leo Frank talking to Mary Phagan, that they’d never seen him with women in his office after hours, and that Conley’s reputation for veracity was bad. One of them, Iora Small, went further, volunteering for the benefit of the all-white jury that “I don’t know of any nigger on earth that I would believe on oath.”

Prosecution witnesses claimed they saw X. Rather than directly attack the veracity of that testimony the defense tried to cloud the issue by producing witnesses who claimed they didn’t see X. The jury, who heard both sides in full detail, found X more credible than not-X.

The motives of Frank’s defenders, including the witnesses who testified in his favor, have at least three components: ethnic jewish loyalty, employer/financial fealty, and “white” racial solidarity (i.e. Whites mistaking jews as comrade “whites”).

The lengthy parade of sworn witnesses, called by both sides, is itself mute testimony to the fact that Leo Frank, vice president of his college debate club, would not testify under oath so as to avoid direct questioning in front of the jury.

A comment on Part 5 directed me to Carlos Porter’s opinion on Frank, LETTER 29 FROM CHICAGO DAVE: SKUNKIE AND THE LEO FRANK FILE:

In my view there is no real evidence against [Leo] Frank. All the so-called evidence comes from Conley, the man who wrote the notes found with the body, and who was CONVICTED AS AN ACCESSORY TO THE MURDER. No attempt was made to imitate the victim’s handwriting, but the police were supposed to find the notes, believe they were written by the victim during commission of the crime, and throw suspicion on a “long tall black negro” (Conley was short and powerfully built).

The police weren’t stupid enough to believe that the victim wrote the notes, but they were stupid enough to believe Conley when he claimed that Frank “dictated” the notes. Why the hell would Frank do that? How the hell COULD he do that? Would you do that if YOU committed a murder? Then they were stupid enough to coach Conley in his testimony for weeks and months to frame Frank for the murder! There is no question that Conley wrote the notes.

Whoever wrote those notes committed the murder. Conley could commit the murder without Frank, but Frank could not commit the murder without Conley.

Frank produced almost 40 witnesses who testified that Conley was a notorious liar. He was also a habitual petty criminal and drunkard who had been on the chain gang several times.

I repeat: if you committed a murder, would YOU write notes like that? Would you DICTATE notes like that? COULD you dictate notes like that? Would you believe a semi-literate drunkard who claimed he wrote those notes because they were dictated by an educated man?

It proves that people believe what they want to believe, regardless of the evidence.

They convicted him to show that “Georgia justice cannot be bought and sold with Jew money from New York”.

I don’t entirely trust anything on the Internet about the Frank case. In most ways, the commutation file is the best.

Porter links to his transcription of a scanned version of Governor John Slaton’s typewritten commutation of Frank’s sentence:

Read the files, OK, there are 29 of them, but there’s not much text on each page. [Note: I transcribed them.]

Appended to this transcript, governor slaton – leo frank commutation file, is a concise summary of Porter’s opinion:

The circumstantial evidence, in my mind, is inconclusive; so is the character evidence. If Frank had been convicted on circumstantial evidence alone, the case would be unclear. The evidence provided by Conley — particularly, the death notes — proves, in my view, that Frank’s guilt is not only out of the question, but absolutely impossible.

That’s the way I feel today, and I’ve felt that way for 30 years.

From the arguments and evidence I have considered so far, I think Frank was guilty. I’m still willing to examine arguments and evidence to the contrary, but in this case the notion that inconclusive evidence can prove anything, much less prove it absolutely, seems particularly ridiculous.

Porter’s argument in favor of Frank is reminiscent of Johnny Cochran’s infamous closing argument in defense of O.J. Simpson: “if it doesn’t fit, you must acquit”. The gist of it is to focus on one aspect of the prosecution’s case, claim there is something wrong with it, and jump to the conclusion that the defendent must be innocent.

Stephen Goldfarb used a similar kind of illogic in “Framed” (discussed in The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 4). Goldfarb makes the outrageous attempt to paint Harry Scott and Hugh Dorsey as scoundrels in order to exhonerate Frank. Porter selects Conley, a far easier mark, for the same end.

The essence of Porter’s argument is: 1) Frank was convicted only because of Conley’s testimony, 2) Conley wrote the murder notes, 3) Conley was a liar, 4) Conley lied about Frank dictating the murder notes, therefore 5) “Frank’s guilt is not only out of the question, but absolutely impossible”.

Point 1, Porter’s assertion that “there is no real evidence against [Leo] Frank. All the so-called evidence comes from Conley”, is plainly false. Conley’s testimony played a critical, perhaps even decisive role in Frank’s conviction, but it was not the only evidence presented against Frank. Frank was arrested and indicted before it was known who wrote the murder notes, much less who conceived them or why. Porter himself points approvingly to Slaton, who described other important evidence against Frank that was unrelated to Conley.

Points 2 and 3 were conceded by Conley and known to the jury.

Point 4 is the heart of Porter’s argument. It is indeed plausible that Conley decided what to write. Frank may have only suggested that Conley write something implicating someone else. Conley might have even come up with the idea himself. Perhaps at first Conley understood the notes as a way to help save his boss, but lied about in court to help implicate his boss because by then it had become clear he needed to save himself.

So what? Even if there is truth in such speculation, it is not necessarily incompatible with the rest of Conley’s story, much less the prosecution’s overall case against Frank.

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The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 8

Published on January 28, 2014 by Tanstaafl in Age of Treason Radio

More on the asymmetry of “anti-semitism”, the jews and violent crime, Nathan Swartz as a direct precedent for Leo Frank, and Jim Conley.

There is no equivalence between Whites and jews because there is no equivalence between hosts and parasites. Thus trying to hold a jew like Frank accountable for a crime is “anti-semitism”. And recognizing that jews are coming to a jew’s defense because they are jews is also “anti-semitism”. “Anti-semitism”, properly understood, is anti-parasitism.

Non-jews sometimes assume that jews must be paranoid to think that everyone is out to get them. Psychological projection gets closer to the truth. The jews imagine everyone around them has the kind of tribal/ethnic/racial loyalty they do and are as furtive about it as they are. Their complaints about “anti-semitism”, as if it is some kind of cohesive anti-jewish sentiment, even when it obviously isn’t, are a reflection of their own solidarity.

The asymmetry is especially obvious when jews complain about “anti-semitism” in people who obviously don’t hate, oppose, or even seem to recognize the jews for what they are. Like the relatively racially aware Southern Whites who, at least until the spectacle the jews made of themselves during the Frank trial, respected and welcomeed the jews and regarded them as “white”. Yet even before the Frank trial the jews saw themselves as separate and distinct.

More on Scott Aaron’s Why I Write and comments quoted in 100 Reasons Leo Frank Is Guilty.

How to reconcile the jewish line on Frank:

Wrongly accused, Falsely convicted, Wantonly murdered.

with Aaron’s description of how White Southerners viewed jews:

If anything, they were seen as an unusually industrious, intelligent, and law-abiding segment of society, even if they were a bit peculiar in their religious views.

The way to reconcile it is to recognize that Whites made a terrible mistake, they thought this supposedly industrious, intelligent, law-abiding segment of their “white” society was only peculiar because of religious views. They didn’t realize that those “religious views” boiled down to a separate identity, hostile to Whites, which viewed Whites as a host, as the Other. Whites made the mistake of trusting jews, of thinking jews saw themselves as part of White society.

Jews, furthermore, were not known for violent acts or crimes, nor feared as violators of white women.

Indeed, jews aren’t known for violent crimes commited on a whim, impulsively, and especially not in contrast with blacks. Jews are however known for intelligent, meticulous planning – the kind required for political violence and premeditated crime, especially in the context of a larger gain, to advance group interests.

The jewish crime syndicate known as Murder, Inc. provides a stark example of the jewish capacity for violence moderated by a cold, calculating sensitivity to group interests:

Probably their most well known victim was Dutch Schultz, who had openly defied the syndicate. In October 1935, Schultz insisted on putting a hit on Dewey, who was leading an all-out effort to put the mob out of business. The syndicate board overruled Schultz. They feared – with good reason – that Dewey’s murder would incite public outrage and result in an even greater campaign to shut down the rackets. Schultz vowed that he would ignore the board’s decision and kill Dewey himself.

The board decided they needed to act immediately to kill Schultz before he killed Dewey. Therefore in an ironic twist Buchalter actually saved Dewey’s life, which allowed Dewey to continue his efforts to bring down Buchalter. This led Shapiro to suggest years later that Schultz should have been allowed to kill Dewey, although at the time he supported the syndicate’s decision to overrule Schultz.

Another example comes from Russia. From STALIN’S WILLING EXECUTIONERS – JEWS AS A HOSTILE ELITE IN THE USSR, Kevin MacDonald’s review of Yuri Slezkine’s book The Jewish Century:

The Gulag was headed by ethnic Jews from its beginning in 1930 until the end of 1938, a period that encompasses the worst excesses of the Great Terror. They were, in Slezkine’s words, “Stalin’s willing executioners” (p. 103).

America’s Jewish Enigma: Louis Marshall – Episode 81 covers The International Jew, Chapter 76, from The Dearborn Independent issue of 26 November 1921:

Louis Marshall has appeared in all the great Jewish cases.

The case of Leo Frank, a Jew, charged with the peculiarly vicious murder of a Georgia factory girl, was defended by Mr. Marshall. It was one of those cases where the whole world is whipped into excitement because a Jew is in trouble. It is almost an indication of the racial character of a culprit these days to note how much money is spent for him and how much fuss is raised concerning him. It seems to be a part of Jewish loyalty to prevent if possible the Gentile law being enforced against Jews. The Dreyfus case and the Frank case are examples of the endless publicity the Jews secure in behalf of their own people.

[Marshall] works on the principle that “the Jew can do no wrong.”

Jewish publicity did to Georgia what it did to Russia ~ grossly misrepresented it, and so ceaselessy as to create a false impression generally.

When Russia fell, Louis Marshall hailed it with delight. The New York Times begins its story on March 19, 1917:

“Hailing the Russian upheaval as the greatest world event since the French Revolution, Louis Marshall in an interview for the New York Times last night said” ~ a number of things, among which was the statement that the events in Russia were no surprise. Of course they were not, the events being of Jewish origin, and Mr. Marshall being the recipient of the most intimate international news.

Even the new Russian revolutionary government made reports to Louis Marshall, as is shown by the dispatch printed in the New York Times of April 3, 1917, in which Baron Gunzburg reports what had been done to assure to the Jews the full advantage of the Russian upheaval.

This glorification of the Jewish overthrow of Russia, it must be remembered, occurred before the world knew what Bolshevism was

This TIJ account, it must be remembered, occurred before Stalin’s willing executioners had even done their dirtiest work.

The murder of 12-year-old Julia Connors by a jew named Nathan Swartz in New York City in the summer of 1912 is a direct precedent. All but forgotten today, the crime was nationwide news at the time and no doubt still fresh in many minds when Leo Frank was accused of murdering Mary Phagan less than a year later.

The main difference is that Swartz confessed. He confided first in his father, who advised him to kill himself. Instead he got a change of clothes from his brother and absconded. Twelve days after the murder Swartz was found dead. He wrote notes admitting he had committed the murder, but denying he was responsibile.

A good summary of the case is provided in an article on SEXUAL CRIMES in Medical Art and Indianapolis Medical Journal, Volume 16, p402, published in January 1913:

Much present interest is attached to the recent brutal murder of little Julia Connors by Nathan Swartz. The details of this case are so fresh in the public mind through the secular press that a mere summary of the facts will suffice here.

At 5:30 p. m., on July 6, 1912, Swartz accidentally met Julia Connors, twelve years of age, but unusually well developed, a girl whom he did not know. Swartz accosted her and allowed her to look through an opera glass which he had in his hand. He lured her to flat occupied by his parents and their family. As soon as she passed the door he seized her by the throat, overpowered her, and threw her to the floor, when she became insensible. He then carried her to the roof and from there down a vacant flat in the adjoining house and into a bath room. In this flat he made about twenty jabs in her back with a knife, slashed her throat and forearms, and stabbed her in the heart. At about half past nine o’clock he thought the child was dead. He had stripped her, in his father’s flat, of her clothing, except a “union suit.” It was found that he had made forty-one rents in this garment with his knife. He then returned to his father’s flat and procured a soap box, which he carried to the place of the murder. He crowded the girl and her clothing into this box, having cut off a great part of her hair.

The details of the finding of the girl the next morning barely alive, her death soon after, and the action of the police have no scientific importance.

The day after the murder and after the body had been found, Swartz, of his own accord, confessed the crime to his father. His father gave him $1.25 to buy a pistol and told him to kill himself and save the family further disgrace. Swartz then disappeared. On the morning of July 18th, twelve days after the murder, he was found dead in a lodging house, having committed suicide by inhaling illuminating gas. In an open letter, unsigned and unaddressed, the general contents of which seem perfectly rational, he wrote:

“I want to say that if I will happen to be revived in order to be executed, why, I will take that medicine just the same. * * * I’m sorry I done it, but I got crazy as I often do and you can’t blame me nor any one.”

On an old linen collar he wrote: “I am guilty, and am insane. It was caused by the beautiful makeup of women.”

Jews acknowledge that somebody must have killed Mary Phagan. If (as they insist) it wasn’t Frank, then it must have been somebody else. Their preferred scapegoat is Jim Conley, the black sweeper at NPC.

100 Reasons Leo Frank Is Guilty | The American Mercury:

1. Only Leo Frank had the opportunity to be alone with Mary Phagan, and he admits he was alone with her in his office when she came to get her pay — and in fact he was completely alone with her on the second floor. Had Jim Conley been the killer, he would have had to attack her practically right at the entrance to the building where he sat almost all day, where people were constantly coming and going and where several witnesses noticed Conley, with no assurance of even a moment of privacy.

22. Jim Conley told police two obviously false narratives before finally breaking down and admitting that he was an accessory to Leo Frank in moving of the body of Mary Phagan and in authoring, at Frank’s direction, the “death notes” found near the body in the basement. These notes, ostensibly from Mary Phagan but written in semi-literate Southern black dialect, seemed to point to the night watchman as the killer. To a rapt audience of investigators and factory officials, Conley re-enacted his and Frank’s conversations and movements on the day of the killing. Investigators, and even some observers who were very skeptical at first, felt that Conley’s detailed narrative had the ring of truth.

23. At trial, the leading — and most expensive — criminal defense lawyers in the state of Georgia could not trip up Jim Conley or shake him from his story.

24. Conley stated that Leo Frank sometimes employed him to watch the entrance to the factory while Frank “chatted” with teenage girl employees upstairs. Conley said that Frank admitted that he had accidentally killed Mary Phagan when she resisted his advances, and sought his help in the hiding of the body and in writing the black-dialect “death notes” that attempted to throw suspicion on the night watchman. Conley said he was supposed to come back later to burn Mary Phagan’s body in return for $200, but fell asleep and did not return.

25. Blood spots were found exactly where Conley said that Mary Phagan’s lifeless body was found by him in the second floor metal room. [In the podcast I incorrectly dismissed this point as redundant with 27. I note now that the two points refer to two different sets of blood spots. – Tanstaafl]

26. Hair that looked like Mary Phagan’s was found on a Metal Room lathe immediately next to where Conley said he found her body, where she had apparently fallen after her altercation with Leo Frank.

27. Blood spots were found exactly where Conley says he dropped Mary Phagan’s body while trying to move it. Conley could not have known this. If he was making up his story, this is a coincidence too fantastic to be accepted.

28. A piece of Mary Phagan’s lacy underwear was looped around her neck, apparently in a clumsy attempt to hide the deeply indented marks of the rope which was used to strangle her. No murderer could possibly believe that detectives would be fooled for an instant by such a deception. But a murderer who needed another man’s help for a few minutes in disposing of a body might indeed believe it would serve to briefly conceal the real nature of the crime from his assistant, perhaps being mistaken for a lace collar.

29. If Conley was the killer — and it had to be Conley or Frank — he moved the body of Mary Phagan by himself. The lacy loop around Mary Phagan’s neck would serve absolutely no purpose in such a scenario.

30. The dragging marks on the basement floor, leading to where Mary Phagan’s body was dumped near the furnace, began at the elevator — exactly matching Jim Conley’s version of events.

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America’s Jewish Enigma: Louis Marshall – Episode 81

Published on January 23, 2014 by Carolyn in The International Jew Study Hour

[CONTENT REDACTED BY REQUEST OF THE AUTHOR]

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The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 7

Published on January 21, 2014 by Tanstaafl in Age of Treason Radio

Concerning Mark Cohen, Scott Aaron and Southern “anti-semitism”.

99 Years Ago: Did Leo Frank Confess?, by Mark Cohen, National Vanguard:

The testimony of Monteen Stover (who liked Frank and who was actually a supportive character witness for him) that Frank was missing from his office for those crucial five minutes was convincing. Few could believe that Stover — looking to pick up her paycheck, and waiting five minutes in the office for an opportunity to do so — would have been satisfied with a cursory glance at the room and therefore somehow missed Frank behind the open safe door as he had alleged.

A summary of Frank’s “confessions”:

• Confession Number One — April 26, 1913: Leo Frank’s murder confession number one was made to Jim Conley when Leo Frank told him he had tried to “be with her” (have sexual intercourse with Mary Phagan) and she refused him. According to Conley, Frank then stated he had hit her, knocking her down, then adding “I guess I struck her too hard and she fell and hit her head against something.” Some of Mary Phagan’s bloody hair was discovered on Monday, April 28, 1913, by Robert P. Barret on the handle of a lathe in the second floor Metal Room.

• Confession Number Two — April 26, 1913: According to the McKnight family, Leo Frank confessed to murdering Mary Phagan to his wife Lucille Selig Frank on the evening of April 26, 1913, at around 10:30 pm, saying to his wife that he didn’t know why he would murder — and asking his wife for his pistol so he could shoot himself. Lucille reportedly told her family, and her household cook and cleaning lady Minola McKnight, about what happened that evening. Minola McKnight told her husband Albert McKnight, and full documentation can be found in State’s Exhibit J (see the Appendix to this article). Decades later, Lucille Selig Frank refused to be buried in the Frank family plot next to her husband, leaving explicit instructions to the contrary.

• Leo Frank Murder Confession Number Three — August 18, 1913: This is the “unconscious bathroom visit” statement delivered by Frank to the court in his unsworn statement, placing him unequivocally at the murder scene at the critical time. Frank would also reaffirm this admission in a newspaper interview published by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution on March 9th, 1914.

Who is Mark Cohen?

Abraham Foxman and Jewish Anti-Defamation League on the Leo Frank Case: 100 Years of Blaming Anti-Semitism and Perpetuating Racist Anti-Gentile Conspiracies to Smear European-American Southerners, at leofrank.org, led me to a July 2012 article on National Vanguard, Leo Frank: Who Really Solved the Mary Phagan Murder Case?:

“Mark Cohen” is the nom de guerre of a man who has devoted his life and fortune to exposing a “century-long conspiracy of those who knowingly omitted testimony and fabricated evidence” to cover up the Leo Frank case

Government policy reflected the prevailing attitude concerning race and racial differencs at the time of the Frank trial, the gist of which is captured in the term separate but equal:

Separate but equal was a legal doctrine in United States constitutional law that justified and permitted racial segregation, as not being in breach of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution which guaranteed equal protection under the law to all citizens, and other federal civil rights laws. Under the doctrine, services, facilities, public accommodations, housing, medical care, education, employment, and transportation were allowed to be separated along racial lines, provided that the quality of each group’s public facilities was equal. The phrase was derived from a Louisiana law of 1890, although the law actually used the phrase “equal but separate.”[1]

The doctrine was confirmed in the Plessy v. Ferguson decision of 1896, which allowed state-sponsored segregation. Though segregation laws existed before that case, the decision emboldened segregation states during the Jim Crow era, which had commenced in 1876 and replaced the Black Codes, which had restricted the civil rights and civil liberties of African Americans with no pretense of equality. 17 states had various institutionalized separation laws.

The doctrine was overturned by a series of Supreme Court decisions starting with Brown v. Board of Education in 1954.

My search for information about Mark Cohen led to Scott Aaron’s leofrank.info. Aaron tries to strike an equivocal pose by imagining a “middle path” between truth and lies, and pretending that there was, is, or ever can be a kind of “separate but equal” arrangement between Whites and jews.

As Aaron explains in Why I Write: Three Strangling Deaths – The Murder of Mary Phagan and the Lynching of Leo Frank:

The case aroused the outrage and ire and vengeance of two great communities. One, the Jewish community, feel overwhelmingly today, and felt to a lesser but still substantial extent in 1913, that Leo Frank was tried and condemned simply because he was a Jew. They believe that Leo Frank is so obviously innocent that he never would have been tried had it not been for endemic anti-Semitism in 1913 Atlanta. And they have been remarkably effective in making Southern anti-Semitism the leitmotif of virtually all drama, documentary, and other remembrance of this case for the last half century. The other, the largely Christian Southern gentile community, believed overwhelmingly in 1913 — and to an unknown but doubtlessly large degree still believes today — that justice was done when all the jurors, and every appeal court in the land including the Supreme Court of the United States, after a monumental and impressively-funded defense, agreed that Leo Frank was fairly tried and convicted for the murder of Mary Phagan. And it must rankle Southerners almost beyond words to be accused of anti-Semitism, when no Christian community anywhere on earth has so respected and welcomed Jews, has so openly acknowledged its spiritual roots in Judaism, or has so enthusiastically supported the Jewish state of Israel.

Aaron describes well enough the increasingly obvious inequality between Whites and jews. He writes out of a concern that this could be bad for the jews:

Will this rediscovery of the truth cause a backlash of real anti-Semitism against Southern Jews or Jews in general? I think not. Just because a few soi-disant [self-styled, so-called] leaders, cranks, and self-promoters palmed off their paranoiac vision of the Frank case on a generation is no reason for a real vendetta. I intend to show that a middle path that respects truth above ethnic and religious loyalty is needed, and Jewish voices should be prominent in leading the way if we are to avoid another swing of the knife-edged pendulum of hate.

One of the most remarkable things I discovered when writing this book was that many of the original articles about this case – even major ones – and affidavits, sworn statements, and utterances of great import from the central participants in the case, were not available online, not searchable, not findable, not even readable. That is, until a courageous man named Mark Cohen, almost 100 years after the fact, scanned in and uploaded nearly all the relevant contemporary newspapers, magazines, and surviving trial materials to his Web site, leofrank.org. I deeply appreciate Mr. Cohen’s efforts in doing this service for us, for our posterity, and for history. (I do not, however, endorse all of Mr. Cohen’s theories of, or conclusions about, this case.) It was a monumental effort that must have taken years.

Aaron minimizes jewish wrongdoing by painting it as the exception and limiting the time frame. The truth is that the “paranoiac vision” of jewish leaders is the rule and the moderation Aaron calls for is the exception. The truth is that jews on the whole have supported Frank from the day he was arrested right up until today. Six short words sum up the attitude of every generation of jews for the past 100 years: “Wrongly accused, Falsely convicted, Wantonly murdered.” They continue to come to Frank’s defense using the flimsiest arguments and by trying to transfer blame to others. In their narrative Frank and jews on the whole are the ones who have been wronged.

There is no sign whatsoever that this will change, and Aaron’s call for “jewish voices” to “be prominent in leading the way” is a call for more of the same of what has been going on for the past century. Aaron simply wants jews to moderate their narrative, to make it less unbelievable. He fears that the gap between their story and reality is too large and too obvious and thus might cause a backlash. He either doesn’t understand or doesn’t want the non-jews he’s posturing for to understand that inverting reality is what jews do, what jews always do, and that they can’t stop doing it because it’s an essential part of who they are. The jewish narrative, their self-image as victims, is part of how their parasitism works. It puts their host on the defensive and provides self-justification for their aggression.

Like Aaron, my hat is off to “Mark Cohen” and his work. Unlike Aaron, it’s not because I have mistaken “Mark Cohen” for an exceptional jew who helps make jews on the whole look more moderate and fair-minded than they really are.

Aaron does however seem to recognize the jewish canard about Southern “anti-semitism”, and this is noted in 100 Reasons Leo Frank Is Guilty, at The American Mercury:

91. The writer Scott Aaron gives insight into Southern attitudes toward Jews when he says: “In the race-conscious South of 1913, Jews were considered white. In fact, in the newspapers of Atlanta before, during, and after the trial of Leo Frank for the murder of Mary Phagan, Frank was referred to as a ‘white man’ on innumerable occasions by reporters, witnesses, African-Americans, fellow Jews, pro-Frank partisans, and anti-Frank polemicists. Jews, furthermore, were not known for violent acts or crimes, nor feared as violators of white women. If anything, they were seen as an unusually industrious, intelligent, and law-abiding segment of society, even if they were a bit peculiar in their religious views.

“Marriage between Jews and Christians might have raised a few eyebrows in both communities – just as did intermarriage between members of widely different Christian denominations – but it was far from unknown, and such couples were not ostracized. In fact, Leo Frank’s own brother-in-law, Mr. Ursenbach, with whom he canceled an appointment to see a baseball game on the day Mary Phagan was killed, was a Christian.

“If there was prejudice against Leo Frank in 1913 Atlanta, it was almost certainly not because he was a Jew. He was, however, a capitalist, a business owner, a manager, an employer of child labor, and a Northerner with an Ivy League education. He also came to be known during the course of the trial as sexually profligate. These facts probably did count against him.”

92. Aaron also cites a study funded and published by a Jewish group: “John Higham, in his ‘Social Discrmination Against Jews 1830 – 1930,’ a work commissioned by the American Jewish Committee, called the South ‘historically the section least inclined to ostracize Jews,’ and drew attention to the ‘striking Southern situation’ of almost no discrimination against Jews there. True, Jewish-Gentile relations had somewhat declined there by the mid-twentieth century, and the massive campaign during the Frank appeals to paint his prosecution, and the South generally, as anti-Semitic — and the eventual creation of the Anti-Defamation League in the wake of Frank’s death — played their part in this change…

“But the aftermath of the Frank trial had no part, of course, in the attitudes of the people of Atlanta on the day Mary Phagan was murdered. All things considered, the South in general and Atlanta in particular seem to have been, if anything, safe havens for Jews where they might escape from the anti-Semitism that was rampant around the beginning of the last century.”

93. Southern attitudes toward Jews can be further gauged by the fact that, during the Civil War, Southerners made a Jew their Secretary of the Treasury: Judah P. Benjamin was the first Jewish appointee to any Cabinet position in any North American government. Benjamin also served as Attorney General, Secretary of State, and Secretary of War for the Confederate States of America. He was so highly regarded that his portrait graced the paper money of the South. Meanwhile, around the same time, Northern general Ulysses S. Grant issued an order physically expelling all Jews from the parts of the South under his control, even demanding that they leave a huge multi-state area “within 24 hours.”

The claim that a pervasive and vicious anti-Semitism was the real reason for the prosecution and conviction of Leo Frank is an absurd lie and a fantastic misrepresentation of history. Nevertheless, it is now the stuff of innumerable works of alleged scholarship, drama, and fiction, and is viewed by naive students who are exposed to such works as the central “truth” of the case. If Leo Frank were innocent, why would his supporters have to fabricate such blatant impostures and engage in emotional blackmail on a colossal scale?

The asymmetry in attitudes between “anti-semitism” and jewish ethnocentrism as motives mirrors the inequality between Whites and jews. Whites recoil from the charge of “anti-semitism”. They regard it as something to deny rather than as an attack. Jews don’t recoil from recognition of their ethnocentrism. They regard it as an attack and respond by attacking.

Southern Whites did indeed respect and welcome jews, and it was to their own detriment. The Southerners gave and the jews took. The jews aren’t grateful. In the 100 years since, the jews have allied themselves with the blacks and overthrown White dominance. Today the jew-controlled mainstream media pours hatred on Whites everywhere with impungnity. They pour hatred most especially on White Southerners, and most especially on the poorest and most powerless. White Southerners like Mary Phagan.

Today Atlanta is a black city. Whites having been leaving in droves for decades. Jews are flocking in. That’s where respecting and welcoming jews gets you.

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The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 6

Published on January 14, 2014 by Tanstaafl in Age of Treason Radio

More on two of Frank’s “confessions”. Also, tracing the history of the jews in Georgia.

The Biography of Mrs. Lucille Selig Frank (Wednesday, February 29, 1888 – Tuesday, April 23, 1957), and Leo Frank Murder Confession Number Two of Four Known:

By 1913, the Selig clan were amongst the most prominent and respected Jewish families in Atlanta, Georgia, not only because two generations earlier in the middle to late 19th century, Levi Cohen, had participated in creating the first permanent Synagogue in Atlanta

On Wednesday, November 30, 1910, Miss Lucille Selig and Mr. Leo Max Frank Were Married.

The evidence presented at the trial suggested Leo might have had an unhappy marriage with a Lucille, especially because she had been barren during her 3 year marriage to Leo and lurid things were alleged to have gone-on behind her back. In other twists and turns revealed during the trial and appeal, there were other accusations that painted Leo Frank as a sexually aggressive rake and mathematician playing the numbers game with a selection of his female employees, as in “testing the waters” to see which ones might potentially be willing to engage in extracurricular actives. There were reports from the factory roustabout Jim Conley, that described Leo Frank cheating on his wife at the factory with Atlantan prostitutes on various Saturdays. Conley recalls two incidents when he walked in on Leo Frank engaging in oral sex on two different Atlanta prostitutes at two different times.

Frank’s final burial 900 miles away on Friday, August 20, 1915, in Cyprus Hills (now Glendale), Queens, New York

Lucille requested cremation in her notarized will and personally requested to her family (Oney, 2004) that her ashes be disbursed in Atlanta, indeed there was no request by Lucille, for her ashes to be buried, or spread, near Leo Frank in NYC.

The empty grave #1 which was reserved for Lucille Selig Frank at the Mount Carmel Cemetery is an uncomfortable reality for the Jewish Community.

Lucille’s missing gravestone is mute testimony that she did not honor her husband in death. It is reasonable to suspect that it was because she had known all along that he had murdered Mary Phagan.

From the perspective of the Jewish community, Lucille’s quiet and controversial 1957 cremation was 2-fold unusual, especially for a faithful, proud, and practicing Jewess from a prominent, and historically significant Jewish family, to go against the traditional practice of burial next to ones deceased spouse or at the very least requesting to have her ashes buried or spread near her husband. While Cremation was a very rare occurrence for Jews in the 1950′s, it is now much more common in the 21st century, but still far from commonplace for prominent Jews.

The history of the jews in Georgia traces back to the first colony.

England’s King George signed a charter establishing the colony and creating its governing board on April 21, 1732. The first 114 Christian colonists arrived from England in February 1733. The first to die in April was the colony’s only doctor.

Judaism and Jews, New Georgia Encyclopedia:

The first Jews to arrive in Georgia were a group of forty-two men and women who came on the schooner William and Sarah. They landed in Savannah on July 11, 1733, soon after founder James Edward Oglethorpe arrived with Georgia’s first settlers. Oglethorpe was surprised by the arrival of the new settlers, but at that point he had not received instructions from the Trustees with regard to non-Christian colonists. He was pleased to see among the group a physician, Samuel Nunes, whom he later credited with saving many colonists who were ill with yellow fever. Oglethorpe cited his gratitude to the doctor among his reasons for assigning plots of land to fourteen Jews. Among other reasons mentioned by scholars is the fact that another one of the Jews, Abraham de Lyon, had experience in viticulture, which would be useful to the colonists in their efforts to produce wine.

Samuel Nunez, Wikipedia:

Samuel Nunis (1668–1744) was a Portuguese physician and among the earliest Jews to settle in North America.

After this ship landed, Captain Thomas Corain, one of General Oglethorpe’s aides, wrote, “Georgia will soon become a Jewish colony.” Captain Corain feared that if this news leaked out, rich Christians would not support the colony and poor Christians would not settle there. The London Trustees urged Oglethorpe to remove them. They had no legal basis for this request as Georgia’s charter permitted all persons “liberty of conscience in the worship of God” except Catholics.

It the cooperation and advocacy of a single man at the top, Oglethorpe, which enabled the jews to infiltrate and establish themselves in Georgia. Who was he enabling? A group of aliens which had for generations lived amongst Europeans under false pretenses.

The Nunis Family Caught by the Inquisition

Such a family was the Nunez family. For many generations, this family kept up its Jewish faith in secret, and some family members met a violent death at the hands of the Inquisition. (A Clara Nunis was burned in Seville, Spain, in 1632; and in the same year, Isabel and Helen Nunis also were condemned to death for loyalty to their Jewish faith.)

One branch of the family, living in Portugal, was among the most distinguished of noble families. Although it was a little more than 200 years after the Expulsion from Spain, this family secretly still observed the Jewish religion.

Although on the surface, Dr. Nunis was as good a Catholic as any churchgoing Christian, the leaders of the Portuguese Inquisition took note of the warnings given to them by the doctor’s enemies. They managed to smuggle an “agent” into the household of the Nunez family in the guise of a servant, so they would be informed of what went on within the family circle.

Eventually, the agent reported that the Nunis family definitely was practicing the Jewish religion in secret. Every Saturday, they all retreated to a synagogue in an underground part of their mansion on the Tagus River in Lisbon. There they threw off their pretense of being Christians and worshiped in true Jewish fashion.

This portion of the story (especially) reads like a typical jewish fairy tale:

Escape to London

Dr. Nunez hit upon a brilliant, bold idea. He arranged a Banquet and Ball to which he invited all of the important people of the city. His guests included many high-ranking officials.[1]

One evening he was host to the captain of a British brigantine anchored in the Tagus River. When the party was in full swing, the captain invited the guests and the Nunez family (accompanied by their unsuspecting Inquisitor keepers) to visit his ship.

What the guests did not know was that a surprise awaited them. About an hour or so after they had boarded the ship, they suddenly became aware that they were moving! Yes, they were, in fact, sailing away from the shores of Portugal at full speed, heading for the friendlier shores of England. Dr. Nunez had every detail arranged with the help of his relatives, the Mendez family, one of whom married Zipra, one of the lovely daughters of Samuel and Rebecca Nunez. Dr. Nunez secretly had succeeded in selling part of his estates and possessions and had transferred the money to England through secret couriers. Thus, he had been able to enlist a British captain to bring his brigantine to the Tagus River on the night of the banquet for the surprise voyage to London in August 1726.

Once in London, Samuel and his sons underwent circumcision to identify themselves as Jewish. Diogo and Gracia remarried in a Jewish ceremony and changed their names to Samuel and Rebecca. Early in 1727, Rebecca gave birth to their seventh and last child, a son who died as an infant.

A few years later in 1733, the Nunez family was among several mainly Sephardic Jewish families from Portugal who left London for the colony of Georgia. Also joining them on the William and Sarah was a small group of Ashkenazi Jews with German origins.

London Jews had been contributing liberally to the Oglethorpe scheme, providing new homes for impoverished Christians in the new colony of Georgia. In 1732 there were 6,000 Sephardic Jews living in London having lived as Crypto-Jews, publicly practicing Roman Catholicism and secretly preserving their Jewish heritage, prior to their departure from Portugal. The Bevis Marks Synagogue, still a Sephardic Jewish congregation in London today, helped finance the trip of their congregants.

All but eight of the original 42 Jewish colonists to Georgia were among these Spanish/Portuguese Jews who had arrived in London seven years earlier. They chartered two boats and sent a total of 90 Jews to Savannah in one year.

Turning back now to Judaism and Jews, New Georgia Encyclopedia:

Thirty-four of the Jewish arrivals in 1733 were Sephardim, most of them having fled from Portugal to England before departing for the New World. The Ashkenazic Jews felt mistreated by the more numerous Sephardic Jews. Indeed, in 1734 an Anglican clergyman in Savannah noted that, “Some Jews in Savannah complained . . . that the Spanish and Portuguese Jews persecute the German Jews in a way no Christian would persecute another Christian.” The internal feuding ended in 1741, during the War of Jenkins’ Ear, when the Sephardim, fearing Spanish invasion, fled to Charleston, South Carolina, and New York, leaving only the Sheftall and the Minis families, both Ashkenazim, in Georgia.

These two families were the leading Jewish families in colonial Georgia, with the Sheftalls being particularly influential.

Atlanta’s Jewish Population

Having been steered away from farming by historical circumstances (for example, many of the governments in Europe imposed restrictions on their owning land), Jews across Georgia tended to gravitate toward nonagricultural work. Thus the history of Georgia’s Jews finds most of them clustered in the more urban areas, especially Savannah and Atlanta; the latter has become the center of Georgia’s largest Jewish population.

At the time of the Civil War (1861-65), only 50 Jews lived in Atlanta; by 2000 the Jewish population had risen to 85,900. The first Jewish Atlantans were Jacob Haas and Henry Levi, who, with their families, settled there about 1846 to become shopkeepers. In 1860, responding to the needs of the Jewish poor during the Civil War, the community formed the Hebrew Benevolent Society.

In addition to such figures as Jacobs [the owner of a drug store chain in which Coca-Cola was supposedly created] and Rich [founder of the company that eventually became Macy’s], Atlanta’s fame in connection with its Jewish citizens centers on two incidents, both grievous examples of anti-Semitism and the marginalization of Jews by accepted white society in Georgia. The first began with the trial and conviction of a Jewish pencil-factory superintendent, Leo Frank, for the murder of Mary Phagan, a thirteen-year-old employee, in 1913. Scholars generally agree today that Frank was almost certainly innocent of the crime. At the time, however, virtually all Georgians thought him guilty.

A commemorative plaque, erected by the Jewish community of Cobb County, now marks the area where Frank was hanged; the plaque reads, “Leo Frank (1884-1915). Wrongly accused, Falsely convicted, Wantonly murdered.”

David Emanuel, a jew, became the 24th Governor of Georgia in 1801.

In 99 Years Ago: Did Leo Frank Confess?, at National Vanguard, “Mark Cohen” makes some interesting points about Leo Frank’s testimony, my emphasis:

The law also did not permit Solicitor General Hugh M. Dorsey or his legal team to orally interpret or comment on the fact that Leo Frank was not making a statement sworn under oath at his own murder trial. The prosecution respected this rule.

The jury knew that Leo Frank had had months to carefully prepare his statement. But what was perhaps most damaging to Leo Frank’s credibility was the fact that every witness at the trial, regardless of whether they were testifying for the defense or prosecution, had been sworn, and therefore spoke under oath, and had been subject to cross-examination by the other side — except for Leo Frank. Thus it didn’t matter if the law prevented the prosecution from commenting on the fact Leo Frank had refused cross examination, opting instead to make an unsworn statement, because the jury could see that anyway. Making an unsworn statement and refusing to be examined does not prove that one is guilty, but it certainly raises eyebrows of doubt.

Frank had emphatically told the seven-man panel led by Coroner Paul Donehoo at the Coroners Inquest, that he (Leo Frank) did not use the bathroom all day long — not that he (Leo Frank) had forgotten, but that he had not gone to the bathroom at all. The visually-blind but prodigious savant Coroner Paul Donehoo — with his highly-refined “B.S. detector” was incredulous as might be expected. Who doesn’t use the bathroom all day long? It was as if Leo Frank was mentally and physically, albeit crudely and unbelievably, trying to distance himself from the bathroom where Jim Conley said he found the body.

Furthermore, Leo Frank had told detective Harry Scott — witnessed by a police officer named Black — that he (Leo Frank) was in his office every minute from noon to half past noon

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The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 5

Published on January 7, 2014 by Tanstaafl in Age of Treason Radio

Nobody confessed to the murder of Mary Phagan. Nobody claimed to have witnessed it. The case against Leo Frank was based largely on circumstantial evidence.

In this installment the focus is on Leo Frank’s behavior, and concerns testimony as to his character and reputation. Instead of putting someone else on trial, as Stephen Goldfarb and other jews have tried to do, we examine why Frank was put on trial.

Continuing our review of 100 Reasons Leo Frank Is Guilty, regarding the nervousness and contradictions by which he first called attention to himself.

38. Former County Policeman Boots Rogers, who drove the officers to Frank’s home and then took them all, including Frank, back to the factory on the morning of April 27, said Frank was so nervous that he was hoarse — even before being told of the murder.

41. When Leo Frank accompanied the officers to the police station later on during the day after the murder, Rogers stated that Leo Frank was literally so nervous that his hands were visibly shaking.

Points 2 through 9 also refer to Frank’s nerves and contradictions.

Points 11, 12 and 13 touch on the discrepancy between Frank’s claim that he was in the office after Phagan’s visit, and Monteen Stover’s testimony that he wasn’t. Frank eventually admitted he might have gone to bathroom, in the metal room, where other evidence and testimony indicated the murder had most likely occurred.

Point 14 mentions Frank’s claim that after Phagan left he heard her speak with another girl, who was never identified.

Point 44, mentioned at the end of the previous installment, concerned the testimony of several young women and girls that Frank had made improper advances toward them. Point 98 is related:

98. Why did the Leo Frank defense team, consisting of some of the most skilled attorneys in the state, refuse to cross-examine 20 young women and girls who testified that Frank had a bad moral character? Under Georgia law, the prosecution was only allowed to use these witnesses’ testimony to enter the general fact that Frank’s character was bad. Under cross-examination, though, the defense could have forced the girls and women to give specific reasons and relate specific incidents that supported their opinion, and trip them up if they could. Why, then, did they not do so? The only reasonable answer: They knew Leo Frank’s character, and they did not dare allow any specifics to go before the jury.

This line of argument also crosses over into Frank’s marriage, his relationship and interaction with his wife.

86. Lucille Selig Frank, Leo Frank’s wife, is known as a fiercely loyal spouse who passionately defended her husband against charges both criminal and moral, and stood by his side during his trial and appeals. There are some indications, however, that she may have early on during the Mary Phagan case believed that her husband had not been entirely faithful and had in fact killed Mary Phagan, probably believing it to be accidental. Long after her husband’s death, she may have returned to those views.

The embedded image of Lucille captures an unpleasant-looking woman. In other photos her dark hair, round, chubby face, and chinese eyes bear a resemblence to Sonia Sotomayor.

The caption on the image, which hints at where the subsequent points are going, reads:

Mrs. Leo Frank in 1913: Is it conceivable that her 29-year-old husband, surrounded every working day by over 150 young women and teenage girls over which he had absolute authority, was unfaithful?

State’s Exhibit J at Leo Frank’s trial consisted of an affidavit by Minola McKnight, the Frank’s black cook. Mrs. McKnight first came to the attention of the authorities when her husband told police that his wife had heard some startling revelations while working at the Frank residence the evening of the murder — namely, that Leo Frank had drunkenly and remorsefully admitted to his wife that he and a girl “had been caught” at the factory, that he “didn’t know why he would murder” her, and that he asked his wife Lucille to get him a pistol so he could kill himself.

These are Minola McKnight’s own words from the affidavit: “Sunday, Miss Lucille said to Mrs. Selig that Mr. Frank didn’t rest so good Saturday night; she said he was drunk and wouldn’t let her sleep with him… Miss Lucille said Sunday that Mr. Frank told her Saturday night that he was in trouble, and that he didn’t know the reason why he would murder, and he told his wife to get his pistol and let him kill himself… When I left home to go to the solicitor general’s office, they told me to mind how I talked. They pay me $3.50 a week, but last week they paid me $4.00, and one week she paid me $6.50. Up to the time of the murder I was getting $3.50 a week and the week right after the murder I don’t remember how much she paid me, and the next week they paid me $3.50, and the next week they paid me $6.50, and the next week they paid me $4.00 and the next week they paid me $4.00. One week, I don’t remember which one, Mrs. Selig gave me $5, but it wasn’t for my work, and they didn’t tell me what it was for, she just said, ‘Here is $5, Minola.’ I understood that it was a tip for me to keep quiet. They would tell me to mind how I talked and Miss Lucille gave me a hat.”

(Leo Frank admitted that he bought a box of chocolates for his wife on the way home on the evening of the day of the murder.) Minola McKnight would tell a different story after she was back in the Frank household, however. She then repudiated her affidavit and said police had coerced it from her. But neither she nor anyone else has given a credible motive for Minola’s husband to have lied. [???]

After Leo Frank’s arrest, Lucille did not visit her husband for some thirteen days, after which she began her loyal and indomitable defense of him. What made her wait? Leo Frank’s explanation was that Lucille had to be “physically restrained” because she wanted so badly to be locked up with him in jail. Judge for yourself the credibility of this explanation against that offered in State’s Exhibit J.

Lucille Frank died in 1957, and in her will she specifically directed that she be cremated and thus not buried next to, or with, her first and only husband, Leo Frank — even though a plot had already been provided for her next to him.

Why would Leo Frank have felt compelled to kill himself? He must have understood that if he wanted to save himself the pain of a trial he could have just confessed and the state would have put him to death. I think it makes more sense that if he thought about killing himself, however briefly, it would have been to save his family, his tribe, his business from further disgrace. What he actually did choose to do was deny responsibility.

Leofrank.org has a lengthy page dedicated to Frank’s wife: The Biography of Mrs. Lucille Selig Frank (Wednesday, February 29, 1888 – Tuesday, April 23, 1957), and Leo Frank Murder Confession Number Two of Four Known.

Lucille’s father Emil Selig passed on to her his Ashkenazic/German surname, which means “blessed”. Her mother, Josephine Cohen, had a Sephardic/canonic jewish surname, one designating the very jewiest of jews.

Lucille’s maternal grandfather Levi Cohen was a religious pioneer who helped found the first synagogue in Georgia. Josephine was like most married women of privilege from good families, she was a pampered housewife with her very own daytime Negro mammy. The Selig family home-base benefited from the employment of 20 year old Magnolia “Minola” McKnight, who served as their daytime cook and maid for 2 years from 1911 to 1913. With Minola taking care of laundry, house cleaning, and cooking for the Selig’s during her work days that began on most days at 6:30 a.m. and ended at 6:30 p.m., thus their really wasn’t a whole lot else left to do around the house for Josephine and Lucille

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The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 4

Published on December 31, 2013 by Tanstaafl in Age of Treason Radio

Concerning mainly the Pinkerton Detective Agency and chief detective Harry Scott.

Pinkerton History:

From Protecting Mid-Western Railways to Providing Corporate Risk Management to Clients Across the Globe

1819 – Allan Pinkerton born in Glasgow, Scotland
1842 – immigrates to US
1847 – joins Chicago police
1849 – 1st detective in Chicago
1850 – Pinkerton Detective Agency founded
1850 – The Pinkerton Code is created: Accept no bribes, Never compromise with criminals, Partner with local law enforcement agencies, …

A typical example of the jewish version of Pinkerton and Scott’s role is provided in The Lynching of Leo Frank:

Coincidentally, Leo Frank hired the services of the Pinkerton Detective Agency to investigate. Recognizing the public climate against Frank, Harry Scott, the chief Pinkerton detective, admitted that they changed their efforts and decided to gather evidence against Frank, since the Pinkertons would be chased out of Atlanta if Frank were to be set free.

Pinkerton Detective Agency, at leofrank.org, is a 1917 court document, part of the lawsuit Pinkerton brought (and ultimately prevailed in) against Frank’s employer, the National Pencil Company, to win payment for services rendered.

Much ado about this lawsuit was made by Stephen Goldfarb (an ashkenazi surname) in an article titled Framed, published in October 1996, in Volume 47, Issue 6 of American Heritage. A copy of this article is archived at leofrank.org under the more apt title, Leo Frank Was Framed According to Stephen J. Goldfarb, an Atlanta (Fulton County) Librarian.

A newly discovered document casts a disturbing light on exactly how Frank’s prosecutor won his case

The reason that the National Pencil Company refused to pay Pinkerton’s bill can be found in the Amended Motion for the New Trial, in which National Pencil claimed that Pinkerton “did not seek honestly and in good faith to ascertain the truth, but, on the contrary, endeavored dishonestly and in bad faith to suppress and distort the truth and to bring about the conviction of Frank regardless of guilt or innocence.” Even though the court found against the National Pencil Company, a fair-minded reading of the Brief of Evidence—a 134-page document that summarizes the trial and whose accuracy was ratified by lawyers for both sides—and of supporting papers strongly suggests that Pinkerton wanted Frank to be found guilty and worked toward that end.

The National Pencil Company’s case against Pinkerton turned on the actions of the agency’s employee Harry Scott. As assistant superintendent of Pinkerton’s Atlanta office, Scott was in charge of the investigation of the Phagan murder from the day after her body was discovered in late April until sometime in August, the month Frank was convicted. Ironically it was Leo Frank himself, as manager of the pencil factory, who arranged with Scott to hire Pinkerton. Not only did Scott take an active part in the investigation, he also supervised all the numerous Pinkerton employees looking into the crime.

Of course, NPC lost their case – their argument that Scott and/or Pinkerton did something wrong was not convincing. It’s more sensible to conclude that the representatives of NPC were the ones operating in bad faith. First, by hiring Pinkerton in the first place, out of a desire to direct the investigation, to exonerate Frank by, for example, framing one or both of the black employees. Second, out of a desire not to pay their bill.

Goldfarb admits Scott’s testimony was a “devastating setback for the defense”, because it:

undermined the veracity of the defendant’s [Frank’s] testimony. Worse still, Scott posed not only as a disinterested third party whose only concern was the truth but as an employee of the defense.

Though the trial had been under way for several days, Scott was the first witness who really aided the case against Frank.

[Lead defense attorney] Rosser was emphatic about how the changes in Scott’s testimony had damaged the defense.

The purpose of Goldfarb’s article, reincarnating this old case in which the argument he favors lost, is to continue Rosser’s effort, to “contradict Scott’s damaging testimony”. How does he do it? By turning reality on its head. Rather than accept that Scott had integrity, was an honest man, Goldfarb defames him, claiming the opposite.

Goldfarb spends the bulk of his effort waving his hands about Scott’s “contradictions”. Dancing all around Scott’s well-known flip-flop – hired by Frank to find the criminal, and then finding that Frank was that criminal – Goldfarb’s argument is that Scott was the real criminal.

From this he leaps to a conclusion (his “inescapable” premise all along), which it turns out is based on a literal conspiracy theory:

In itself this document, the Brief of Evidence, which has for so long lain dormant, does not prove guilt or innocence. It does, however, add substantially to the evidence that Leo Frank did not receive a fair trial. In fact, the conclusion that he was railroaded is now inescapable.

Whatever his reasons, Harry Scott was a key figure in convicting Frank of murder. Less certain, but still highly suggestive, was the malign role played by the prosecutor, Hugh Dorsey. Here ambition was certainly a motive, and a successful one, for Dorsey was twice elected governor of Georgia. This document strongly suggests that Dorsey urged witnesses to embellish their testimony, even lie under oath, to build a case against Frank.

The picture that emerges from this civil trial over an unpaid bill is of a conspiracy between the prosecutor Hugh Dorsey and Harry Scott of Pinkerton’s National Detective Agency to find Leo Frank guilty of murder. Although we will almost certainly never know just what was said between Dorsey and Scott, their collaboration seems to have assured that Leo Frank would not receive a fair trial for a crime he almost certainly did not commit.

Goldfarb’s lame argument echoes the jewish consensus. It isn’t about the murder of Mary Phagan. It’s about Leo Frank being a victim. “Wrongly accused, Falsely convicted, Wantonly murdered.” Or as Goldfarb puts it, HE WUZ FRAMED!

Well, it’s either that or Scott and Dorsey were honest men who collaborated to convict Frank because they were convinced he was the murderer. Goldfarb’s desire to malign them instead makes him just another in a long line of Frank apologists, willing to say or do whatever is necessary to exonerate Frank, inverting reality, defaming and even framing others in the process.

Why? What are their motives? I think it’s out of care for their own kind, to help a member of their tribe, to help their tribe, to help themselves as members of that tribe. The jewish reaction to the murder of Mary Phagan is a sterling example of ethnic solidarity, of typical jewish behavior.

There are reasons to believe Frank was guilty which stand apart from any supposed malfeasance by Scott or Dorsey.

100 Reasons Leo Frank Is Guilty, published at The American Mercury on 26 April 2013, is more like 100-plus paragraphs which fall into a handful of main categories. Among the two themes in the first 50-odd points is the one I’ve focused on this installment and the last – manipulation of the investigation, in particular via private investigators.

19. Almost immediately after the murder, pro-Frank partisans with the National Pencil Company hired the Pinkerton detective agency to investigate the crime. But even the Pinkertons, being paid by Frank’s supporters, eventually were forced to come to the conclusion that Frank was the guilty man. (The Pinkertons were hired by Sigmund Montag of the National Company at the behest of Leo Frank, with the understanding that they were to “ferret out the murderer, no matter who he was.” After Leo Frank was convicted, Harry Scott and the Pinkertons were stiffed out of an investigation bill totaling some $1300 for their investigative work that had indeed helped to “ferret out the murderer, no matter who he was.” The Pinkertons had to sue to win their wages and expenses in court, but were never able to fully collect.

20. That is not to say that were not factions within the Pinkertons, though. One faction was not averse to planting false evidence. A Pinkerton agent named W.D. McWorth — three weeks after the entire factory had been meticulously examined by police and Pinkerton men — miraculously “discovered” a bloody club, a piece of cord like that used to strangle Mary Phagan, and an alleged piece of Mary Phagan’s pay envelope on the first floor of the factory, near where the factory’s Black sweeper, Jim Conley, had been sitting on the fatal day. This was the beginning of the attempt to place guilt for the killing on Conley, an effort which still continues 100 years later. The “discovery” was so obviously and patently false that it was greeted with disbelief by almost everyone, and McWorth was pulled off the investigation and eventually discharged by the Pinkerton agency.

21. It also came out that McWorth had made his “finds” while chief Pinkerton investigator Harry Scott was out of town. Most interestingly, and contrary to Scott’s direct orders, McWorth’s “discoveries” were reported immediately to Frank’s defense team, but not at all to the police. A year later, McWorth surfaced once more, now as a Burns agency operative, a firm which was by then openly working in the interests of Frank. One must ask: Who would pay for such obstruction of justice? — and why?

35. Pinkerton detective Harry Scott, who was employed by Leo Frank to investigate the murder, testified that he was asked by Frank’s defense team to withhold from the police any evidence his agency might find until after giving it to Frank’s lawyers. Scott refused.

46. In May, around the time of disgraced Pinkerton detective McWorth’s attempt to plant fake evidence — which caused McWorth’s dismissal from the Pinkerton agency — attorney Thomas Felder made his loud but mysterious appearance. “Colonel” Felder, as he was known, was soliciting donations to bring yet another private detective agency into the case — Pinkerton’s great rival, the William Burns agency. Felder claimed to be representing neighbors, friends, and family members of Mary Phagan. But Mary Phagan’s stepfather, J.W. Coleman, was so angered by this misrepresentation that he made an affidavit denying there was any connection between him and Felder. It was widely believed that Felder and Burns were secretly retained by Frank supporters. The most logical interpretation of these events is that, having largely failed in getting the Pinkerton agency to perform corrupt acts on behalf of Frank, Frank’s supporters decided to covertly bring another, and hopefully more “cooperative,” agency into the case. Felder and his “unselfish” efforts were their cover. Felder’s representations were seen as deception by many, which led more and more people to question Frank’s innocence. (Atlanta Georgian, May 15, 1913, “Burns Investigator Will Probe Slaying”)

The second main theme has to do with to circumstances and evidence, including Frank’s own words and behavior.

44. Several young women and girls testified at the inquest that Frank had made improper advances toward them, in one instance touching a girl’s breast and in another appearing to offer money for compliance with his desires. The Atlanta Georgian reported: “Girls and women were called to the stand to testify that they had been employed at the factory or had had occasion to go there, and that Frank had attempted familiarities with them. Nellie Pettis, of 9 Oliver Street, declared that Frank had made improper advances to her.

The image is from The Atlanta Constitution › 13 July 1913, via The American Mercury. The caption reads:

Detective Harry Scott (in Panama hat) of the Pinkertons, who played the hunch that Jim Conley, the negro, knew something of the girls murder. The accompanjing figure is Detective John Black, of police headquarters, whose work in operation with the Pinkerton man did much to solve the crime. Great dependence will be put in their testimony at the coming trial of Leo Frank, charged with the murder of Mary Phagan.

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The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 3

Published on December 24, 2013 by Tanstaafl in Age of Treason Radio

Mary Phagan’s life was cut short before Christmas in 1913.

1. Candy
2. Nuts
3. Rocking horse
4. Doll
5. Mittens/gloves
6. Toy train
7. Oranges
8. Books
9. Handkerchiefs
10. Skates

What would have happened if the White mob had actually lynched Newt Lee, the negro night watchman initially suspected of committing the crime? There would have been no Leo Frank arrest, or trial. No need for a jewish narrative about Frank. Hardly anyone would remember the murder today.

Did Frank think, whether beforehand or on the fly, that he could get away with the murder by framing one or both of the negroes (Newt Lee or Jim Conley) who worked for him? Did Frank or someone in cahoots with him instigate the mob – to end the controversy quickly and finally, to protect Frank or his jew-owned company?

For an idea of what happened during the early days of the investigation we turn to a description from the forward to Arguments of Hugh M. Dorsey in the Leo Frank Murder Trial, written by Nicholas Christophulos and published on 20 April 1914:

FACTS OF CRIME.

On Saturday, April 26, 1913 [Confederate Memorial Day], Mary Phagan, a fourteen-year-old operative in the employ of the National Pencil Company, in Atlanta, Ga., left home at a little after 11 o’clock, going to the pencil factory to get her pay. She had not worked at the plant since the Monday previous, owing to the fact that they had no metal for use in her branch of the work. It is admitted that Leo M T Frank, the superintendent of the pencil factory, was the last person ever positively known to have seen her alive.

At about 8 o’clock Sunday morning, April 27th ± her dead body was discovered in the rear of the basement in the building occupied by the National Pencil Company by the night watchman, Newt Lee. She had a cord drawn tightly around her neck, and according to the contention of the State had been dead from 16 to 20 hours or more at the time her body was discovered.

The little girl’s underclothing was torn in several places, and the crime was pronounced by physicians as well as police officers as unquestionably the work of a pervert. It is generally conceded that Mary Phagan was an unusually pretty and attractive child –

Newt Lee, the night watchman, was immediately held by the police, and several Other suspects were arrested 1 during the next two days, the climax coming on Tuesday, April 29th, when Leo M. Frank was detained at police headquarters by the authorities, he having been under suspicion since immediately after the crime was discovered.

Signs of external manipulation can be found from the start and persist to the present day. In the Internet Archive description attached to Dorsey’s argument we find:

Alas, the original 7 volume Leo M. Frank murder trial transcript stenographed on 3,647 pages of cap paper (Bass Rosser, 1914) was stolen from the Georgia State Archives around the early 1960’s (Archivist Smith, 2011) and is still missing today, presumed gone forever after 50 years.

Who has the motive and means to do such things?

A good indication of the contemporary views of Frank’s guilt is provided in the brief chronology of major events in the investigation and trial:

The Coroner’s Inquest, April 30, 1913 to May 8, 1913

Over 150 people are sworn under oath and testify to questioning in the Coroners Inquest, resulting in Coroner Paul V. Donehoo and his Coroners Jury of 6 men making a unanimous recommendation (7 to 0) that Leo M. Frank be bound over for murder and held accountable before the Grand Jury to review the facts and evidence in the case.

Fulton County Grand Jury Indictment for Leo Frank

More than a dozen police, detectives, and employees testified during the Fulton County Grand Jury. Monteen Stover told the Jury that when she went to collect her pay envelope from Leo Frank at the National Pencil Company, he was not in his office on April 26, 1913, between the designated time between 12:05 pm and 12:10 pm.

After reviewing the facts, evidence and testimony with thorough and serious deliberation, Leo M. Frank was indicted unanimously by a Grand Jury of 21 men (including 4 Jewish members) on Saturday, May 24th 1913. The unanimous vote of 7 to 0 by the Coroners Inquest and Jury, plus the unanimous vote of the Grand Jury of 21 to 0, put Leo Frank at a distinct disadvantage with a total of 28 to 0 against him going into his capital murder trial.

A Trial of the Century

Leo Frank is prosecuted during a 29 day trial beginning on Monday, July 28th 1913 and successfully convicted by a petite Jury of 12 men on Monday, August 25th 1913 (unanimously 13 to 0 including Judge Roan on Tuesday, August 26, 1913), as a result of well thought out, reasoned and logical arguments presented by the Hugh M. Dorsey legal team, a culmination, based on the trial testimony, facts and evidence. The 13 to 0 vote, when added to the 21 to 0 vote of the Grand Jury and 7 to 0 vote of the Coroners Inquest Jury resulted in a 41 to 0 vote against Leo Frank.

Leo Frank appealed the case to the Georgia Supreme Court who ruled the evidence sustained a guilty verdict. Judge Benjamin Hill of the Fulton County Superior Court was so convinced of Leo Frank’s guilt after reviewing the Brief of Evidence, that on March 7, 1914, he sentence Leo Frank to be hanged on his 30th Birthday, April 17, 1914!

Appeals

Leo Frank would aggressively pursue two more years of appeals failing each and every time up and down the entire United States Legal System, from the Georgia Superior Court, Georgia Supreme Court, Federal District Courts to the United States of America to the Supreme Court of the United States of America, TWICE! It was Hugh Dorsey that fought against Leo Frank each and everytime and won!

Confederate Memorial Day was initiated in Georgia, on April 26th 1866, to honor those who died fighting for the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. Nine states officially observe Confederate Memorial Day (using several different dates): Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas. The Memorial Day holiday that is currently observed in the entire United States was initiated in 1868, in emulation of the spirit and practices of Confederate Memorial Day.

Naming the American Civil War:

The most common name in modern American usage, is simply “the Civil War”. Although used rarely during the war, the term “War Between the States” became widespread afterward in the Southern United States. During and immediately after the war, Northern forces often used the term “War of the Rebellion”, while the Southern equivalent was “War for Southern Independence”. The latter regained some currency in the late 20th century, but has again fallen out of use. Other terms often reflect a more partisan view of events, such as “War of Northern Aggression”

As noted, there are signs of outside (jewish) meddling with the investigation from the start.

From Chronology of Events in the Leo Max Frank Epic Saga:

April 26: Mary Phagan murdered.

April 28: NPC hires Pinkerton.

April 29: Leo Frank arrested.

April 30: George Epps, a fifteen year old friend of Mary Phagan, testified that Phagan was afraid of Frank because he had winked, flirted and made inappropriate sexual advances toward her.

May 1: Jim Conley, a sweeper at the factory, arrested.

May 3: Two impostors posing as Pinkerton detectives had interviewed George Epps (Phagan’s friend who had reported she was afraid of Leo Frank) and Phagan’s mother.

In the service of Frank’s defense Conley was eventually turned into the main scapegoat. From Wikipedia’s page on Frank:

In its closing statements, the defense attempted to divert suspicion from Frank to Conley. Lead defense attorney Luther Rosser, said to the jury: “Who is Conley? He is a dirty, filthy, black, drunken, lying, nigger.” Frank had issued a widely publicized statement questioning how the “perjured vaporizings of a black brute” could be accepted in testimony against him.

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Page 1 of 212

The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 11

The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 10

The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 9

The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 8

America’s Jewish Enigma: Louis Marshall – Episode 81

The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 7

The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 6

The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 5

The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 4

The Murder of Mary Phagan – Part 3

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