The young fellow that helped me dispose of the stones was the wayward
son of a fine family and it would not be right to them to use his name.
I will call him “Spokane,” the monoger he was known by among his
associates. He had been in San Francisco for years and was familiar with
an underworld that I had seen very little of. Most of my life had been
spent on the road or roughing it in out-of-the-way places, broken by a
few months now and then in city slums. He introduced me into the elegant
hop joints where we smoked daily, into the hangouts of polished bunko
men and clever pickpockets, into the gilded cafés and other exclusive
and refined places of entertainment.
I grew tired of this life after a few months and suggested to Spokane
that he go up to the Canadian line and lift the plant of watches and
rings. The burglary cry had died out and I had arranged to sell them all
where they would never rise up to accuse me. This trip suited him, as it
would give him a chance to visit his people in Spokane, Washington, and
it pleased me to have him go because I didn’t want to take chances with
the watches which were all numbered and easy of identification. I had
left them behind me rather than carry the bulky package around and
chance losing the more valuable stones because of it. I gave him a
diagram of the spot where the plant was, supplied him with tickets and
traveling expenses, and sent him on his way with instructions to express
the parcel to the San Francisco express office, value it at twenty-five
dollars, and tell the express agent it contained samples of ore.
To make everything safe and sure, I further instructed him to stand at
the depot when the train was in and make sure the parcel went into the
express car, then to take a train the next day and come back to San
Francisco by an indirect route which would protect him in case anything
happened to the package en route. I put in a couple of anxious weeks,
but he showed up in due time with the good news that he had located the
junk without trouble and sent it along exactly as he had promised. He
called for it at the express office the next day, but it hadn’t arrived.
Not caring to make too much fuss over a package valued at twenty-five
dollars, we waited a few days before he went back for it. The express
office was in Montgomery Street then, and I stood in the Palace Hotel
entrance where I could look across the street and see him showing the
receipt and arguing with the clerks. His willingness to go to the office
every day convinced me he was on the square. He had a receipt for the
package; I assumed it had gone astray.
We talked the thing over and decided there was nothing to be afraid of.
If the parcel had been seized by the police he would have been pinched
at the express office. I began to get suspicious after a week and was
for abandoning the whole thing, but Spokane insisted on making another
call. From my spot across the street I saw two men fall on him when he
spoke to the clerk and knew he was arrested.
I went straight to my room, got everything and moved to another, where I
sat down and tried to figure out what had happened and what to do. His
arrest was a mystery, but it was plain to me that I must either jump out
on him or stay and help. I was clean, there wasn’t a scrap of evidence
against me. If I deserted him that might cause him to squawk, and with
his testimony they could convict me if they got me. I knew the police
would accuse him of the burglary and that he could and would convince
them in an hour that he was in San Francisco when it occurred. That
would start them on a hunt for another man, and that would bring them to
me, for I had been seen with him daily for months. I saw I would be
picked up; I saw they could prove I was in the town where the burglary
was committed, and at the time. But they could get no further. The
evidence to convict me was not in existence. I could not be convicted
without Spokane’s testimony.
I was reasonably certain he would protect me if I protected him. I sent
and found that the police had not been to the room I deserted; that
meant he was standing up. I decided to stay and take a pinch and have
the business settled while I had money to fight. After making this
decision I cleaned up a few odds and ends of jewelry, put them away in
my safety box, and left the key in a secure place. I took a thousand
dollars in hundred-dollar bills and secreted it in different parts of my
clothes. The pawn tickets had all been destroyed the minute we got them.
I felt perfectly secure, and went openly around the hangouts waiting for
the blow to fall.
It came in a hurry, and to my surprise I was put in the cell occupied by
Spokane. I learned later that the cell had some kind of listening
arrangement, but we did not discuss our troubles. We were both “on the
small book,” which meant incommunicado, but I promised a trusty prisoner
a dollar if he would get word out to an attorney I had in mind. He was
one of the leading criminal lawyers at that time, and had us both out to
talk to him the next morning. The evening papers carried the story of my
arrest and of the burglary. The attorney had read it, and seeing it was
a case of considerable magnitude he came at once. He did not believe in
any fat fees being held incommunicado.
I gave him a substantial retainer and asked him to find out what we were
charged with and what we were being held on. Spokane had got barely an
hour’s sleep at one time in the three days he had been in. Policemen
and detectives took turn about questioning him, trying to wear him down
to the weakening point. They now started on me, threatening, blustering,
cajoling, wheedling, and promising. I made no statement except that I
was innocent. There was no local interest in the case, and we were not
mistreated. Captain Lindheimer, long dead now, was in charge of the city
prison. He frowned on the beating-up of prisoners, and there was very
little of it done when he was in charge. He was a very humane man, and
of all the prisoners that passed through his hands I don’t recall ever
hearing one with a harsh word for him.
Our attorney had influence enough to get our meals sent from the
outside; we bought clean, new blankets from the head trusty and plenty
of opium, which we ate. Spokane’s wife was permitted to visit us, the
police probably figuring they could follow her to something that would
convict us. She had not been told anything, knew nothing, and could do
us no harm.
Out of my thousand dollars I got in with, I saw to it that she was taken
care of. This was only fair to Spokane, and helped him to help me by
keeping his mouth shut.
The attorney could learn nothing except that we were being held on
telegrams. “This is soft,” he said. “They can’t hold you on that. I’ll
take you out on a writ of habeas corpus.”
The next morning we went into court on the writ. The court gave the
police twenty-four hours to get something more substantial than
telegrams, threatening to liberate us if they failed. When we appeared
the next day they had nothing except more telegrams, and we were
discharged from custody.
I grabbed the attorney’s hand. “Don’t get excited,” he said, “they’re
not done with you yet.”
Although the judge released us we were promptly rearrested at the
courtroom door and put in our cell. The attorney applied for another
writ. This was granted and we went to court again the next day, but were
put over twenty-four hours on the plea of the police that witnesses were
on their way from Canada. No witnesses appeared, and we were discharged
only to be arrested again. The court warned the police that they would
be in contempt if we were held longer without evidence.
On our next day in court we were confronted by the chief of provincial
detectives from Victoria with a warrant of extradition and a day was set
for him to make his showing. One night a strange attorney came to me in
the prison, told me he had had a talk with the judge, and that for a
sum of money he would point out a flaw in the case that would upset
the extradition plea. I sent for my attorney and asked his advice. He
investigated, and told me to put up the money.
When we went into court the Canadian officer produced his warrant. It
was the biggest document I ever saw—a piece of parchment about three
feet long, embossed, engraved, and signed and sealed with the seal of
Queen Victoria—a formal demand from the British Government on the
Secretary of State to deliver us over to the Canadian authorities. He
had it in a bag carefully rolled and wrapped in paper. Taking it out
carefully, reverently, he placed it in the judge’s hands.
“Where did you get this document?” the court asked.
“From Ottawa, the capital of Canada,” the officer answered.
“Did you go to Ottawa yourself for it?”
“No, it came to Victoria by mail.”
Looking at it closely the judge pointed to a name signed at the bottom.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“That is the signature of Lord Aberdeen, governor general of Canada.”
“Did you see him sign it?”
“No.”
“Hm,” said the judge, laying it down.
Our lawyer picked it up and appeared to read it carefully. Turning to
the officer, he asked: “How do you know that is Lord Aberdeen’s
signature? Were you there when he signed it? Did you ever see him sign
his name to any paper? Did you ever see Lord Aberdeen? What’s this
thing?” He tapped the seal, the big red seal half as large as your hand.
“That is the seal of Her Majesty, Queen Victoria of England,” the man
answered, getting indignant and red in the face.
“Oh, it is, is it? How do you know it is? Did you see her put it there?
Is she here to identify it? There’s no Victoria here in this court, is
there? This might be the seal of Jane Doe, a waitress. Anybody can have
a seal. Do you think the court is going to recognize this thing? You’ll
have to come in here with something better than that,” he said, throwing
it on the floor and kicking it under a table.
The officer got down from the witness stand, picked it up, brushed it
off, and carefully put it away.
The judge then said: “This court cannot recognize that as a valid
document. You come here with a paper demanding custody of these
defendants, but we have here no proof that it is genuine. It might be a
forgery. We know there is such a person as Lord Aberdeen, of Canada,
but we have no proof that his signature is on that warrant. I cannot
hold defendants on such evidence.”
We were discharged again. I don’t know where the money went that I gave
the lawyer who sold us the point that beat the extradition; I know the
judge didn’t give us any the worst of it.
We were arrested again at the door. That night we were indicted by the
grand jury; I for bringing stolen property into the state of California,
and Spokane for receiving it from me. The police saw we were framing and
using money, so they, rather than be beaten, began framing us. Our cases
were transferred into another court where they could do some fixing, and
we couldn’t. The indictments meant that we would have to wait for
trial. I began to get uneasy about the stones I had in the safety box.
The police were tearing the town open for them, not knowing that nearly
all of them had been sold. I told our lawyer where to get the key to the
box, gave him a password, and told him to take the junk out and put it
in some safe place. The police “tailed” every visitor we had and even
the lawyer in hopes of locating the stones, and he had to be careful.
Making another application for a writ of habeas corpus, which he knew
would not avail us, he had the hearing set for ten o’clock in the
morning. This alarmed the coppers and every one of them was at the
courtroom when the case was called. Everybody was there but our
attorney. The hearing was held up for fifteen minutes. During this
fifteen minutes he was at the safety vault lifting the plant, while
every detective on the case was waiting in court. He came in, nodded to
us, apologized to the court, and went on with the case with the parcel
of loot in his pocket. The writ was denied, of course. I told him to put
the stuff away, and he did.
When I asked him about it later, he looked me straight in the eye and
said: “Did you think I was damn fool enough to keep that stuff around
me? Say, when court adjourned that day I went straight down to the foot
of Powell Street and threw it in the bay.”
This didn’t look just right to me, but what could I do? I was only a
poor, honest burglar in the hands of a highway lawyer. He got us a copy
of the testimony given the grand jury, and from it I learned what had
caused our arrest—Spokane’s passion for gambling.
After lifting the watches and rings in the little Northern town, he
tried his luck at the faro table and lost his expense money. This forced
him to open the parcel and sell a couple of the watches to a gambler for
enough money to buy his return ticket. The next day the gambler took
them to the town where I stole them, fifteen miles away, across the
line, and tried to pawn them. He was arrested and told where he got
them. In an hour the police learned about the express package of “sample
ore” Spokane shipped. It was seized en route to San Francisco. There was
a big reward for the burglar, and the Northern police, wanting it,
decided to capture him. Instead of wiring to have him arrested the first
time he went to the express office, they hurried here and got him
themselves.
Spokane was repentant, but it was too late. I did not reproach him.
His wife was faithful, and devoted to him, and visited us daily at the
prison, bringing papers and small delicacies. One evening, while we were
chatting on a bench in the visiting room, an officer came and took him
out to another room. Several policemen were standing around, and there
seemed to be something stagy going on that I couldn’t understand.
Suddenly, as I sat talking to Mrs. Spokane, a screen at the other side
of the room was knocked aside and Irish Annie dashed from behind it,
heaping abuse on me and trying to get her hands on my friend’s wife.
Annie’s furious appearance was like a thunderbolt out of a clear sky. I
saw instantly that she had been poisoned against me. I tried to talk to
her but she wouldn’t listen, and the coppers stood between us pushing me
away to make her think I was trying to get my hands on her and strangle
her. Mrs. Spokane had collapsed on the bench, almost fainting from fear
and wondering what it was about. Annie was led away screaming threats.
Spokane’s wife went home, and we back to our cell where we tried to
piece together this unexpected angle.
I saw the police were playing my game better than I could. They knew I
was trying to frame myself out; they began framing me in, and with Irish
Annie they had a dangerous lead on me. It was plain to me that they had
told her she was discarded for another woman; that they had called
Spokane away to leave me alone with his wife while Annie watched from
behind the screen. I could almost hear them saying to her: “There you
are. There’s the woman he left you for. There’s the woman he hung his
diamonds on, and spends his money on. How he got her is a mystery to us;
she’s a decent woman. She’s crazy about him and believes he is
innocent.”
Then Annie, too ready to believe herself “a woman scorned,” turned
copper on me, knocked the screen away, and poured out the vials of her
wrath. Still I wasn’t much alarmed about the case and I couldn’t help
admiring the coppers for the way they tooled Annie and chiseled her out
of her right senses. They assumed I was guilty; that gave them the right
to assume that she, being my companion, knew something about the
burglary. They were justified in getting it out of her by fair or unfair
means. I knew she was ignorant of the least detail of it, and felt like
laughing at them for wasting time on their elaborate scheme.
Our attorney made many efforts to see her, but the police had her in a
hotel under the eye of a matron, and he and his runners failed.
At last he subpœnaed her as our witness and had her brought to his
office. All his eloquence got nothing out of her. She was mute and
stayed mute till the day of my trial. She had not been before the grand
jury. We had no police-court examination and there was no way of
finding out what she was going to say till she went into court. The
attorney was apprehensive. I wasn’t. I told him of the night I first met
her shivering in a Chicago doorway, of the warm clothing I got for her,
and of the night I staggered out of her crib with the dead man over my
shoulder. I told him in detail of our meeting in the North by chance,
and of our relations there. He was old and wise. He shook his head
thoughtfully and quoted the poet’s line about scorned women and their
hellish fury.
The prosecution clamored for a speedy trial of the case. Almost ten
thousand dollars had been spent by the Canadian authorities in retaining
a firm of high-priced lawyers to prosecute; in transporting witnesses
and paying hotel and other bills, and for private detectives hired to
spy on the local police. Still no diamonds showed up. Spokane was
offered a job with the Pinkerton Detective Agency if he would turn on
me. I was promised my liberty if I would turn up the stones. We kept up
our cry of innocence and made no statements at any time. A week before
the day set for my trial, our attorney was stricken in his study and
died in his chair, of heart failure.
We had to get another lawyer and pay another stiff fee. I went over the
case with him, but somehow was unable to convince him that I had not
talked too much to Irish Annie.
At my trial she swore, and she wasn’t mealy-mouthed about it, either,
that I told her of the burglary when I was planning it; that I offered
her part of the stones when I got them; that she was afraid to take them
because they were stolen. She added that she would have notified the
police then, but was afraid I would kill her or have her killed. On
cross-examination she said she was not testifying in hope of a reward or
in revenge; that she was glad to be rid of me, and hoped I would be
sentenced to life so I couldn’t get out and murder her.
The next witness was a pawnbroker the police dug up. Spokane had sold
him a piece of jewelry. It was identified by the loser and put in
evidence. The witness identified me as the one who sold it to him and
produced his book showing a fictitious name Spokane had signed. I got
alarmed and protested loudly. Spokane, who was in court, jumped up and
cried out to the judge that he pawned the article. The court ordered him
to sit down, and my lawyer told him if he testified to that, he would be
convicted on his own statement of receiving it from me, when his trial
came on. Our attorney tried to get a sample of my handwriting before the
jury. The prosecutors objected, and the judge ruled that no exemplars
could be admitted in evidence unless they were written before the
burglary was committed. I could not dig up any that old, and the case
went to the jury with no defense except my sworn denial of guilt.
When the jury disappeared in their room and court was adjourned, I lit a
cigarette. Before I had half finished, the jury was back with their
verdict, “Guilty, as charged.”
Spokane’s trial was set, but I made affidavit that he was an innocent
tool in the matter, and he was dismissed. He worried himself sick
because of his carelessness in getting me arrested and in a few months
fell a victim of tuberculosis. His devoted wife contracted it in nursing
him and long before I was at liberty they were both dead and buried.
In due time I was sentenced to eight years at Folsom. The case went on
appeal to the supreme court and I settled down for a long wait in the
old Broadway county jail. My case gave me food for much interesting
thought. I was guilty. Justice had overtaken me. But let us see how
justice fared. It seemed to me that the blind goddess got a tough deal
herself. Everybody connected with the case outraged her. The first
judge took money. The coppers framed me in. The witnesses perjured
themselves. The second judge was so feloniously righteous that he stood
in with the framing. My lawyer was a receiver of stolen goods—even stole
some from me. And the police told me that the Jewelers’ Association beat
them out of the reward.
That’s one side of the case; here’s another. The jeweler was bankrupt.
The Canadian authorities spent ten thousand dollars. The state of
California had to feed and clothe me while I was in prison.
Here’s another side of it. Spokane and his wife died of T.B. that he
contracted while in jail; and “justice” overtook Irish Annie for what
she had done to me.
Not very pleasant reflections; especially when I had to admit to myself
that I was the cause of everything from the burglary to the punishment
of Annie, and all that happened in between them. Yet this burglary is by
no means unique. It frequently happens that the initial loss in dollars
and cents is as nothing compared to the wrong and injury that radiate
from such crimes like ripples on a pond.