Two witnesses claim to have identified Vanzetti as an occupant of the
murder car.
(1) Harry E. Dolbeare testified that somewhere between 10 and 12 a.
m. he saw a car going past him in South Braintree, with five people
in it, one of whom he identified as Vanzetti. Q. “There was nothing
that attracted your attention in this case except one man leaning
forward as though he was talking to another man?” A. “Yes, there
was.” But Mr. Dolbeare found it impossible to explain definitely what
attracted his attention to this particular man, and finally explained
that it was the appearance of the whole five that attracted his
attention.
(2) Le Vangie, gate-tender of the New Haven Railroad, was on duty
at the South Braintree grade crossing the day of the murder. He
testified that the murder car drove up to the crossing just as he
was lowering the gate. A man inside forced him, at the point of
a revolver, to let them through before the advancing train. He
identified Vanzetti as the man driving the car. His testimony was
discredited by the testimony of McCarthy, locomotive fireman of the
New Haven, who testified that three quarters of an hour after the
murder, “Le Vangie said, ‘There was a shooting affair going on.’ I
says, ‘Some one shot?’ I says, ‘Who?’ He says, ‘Some one—a fellow got
murdered.’ I said, ‘Who did it?’ He said he didn’t know... I asked
him if he knew them. He said no, he did not. I asked him if he would
know them again if he saw them. He said no. He said all he could see
was the gun, and he ducked.”
Moreover, Le Vangie was discredited by all the other identification
witnesses on both sides, who insisted that the driver of the car was
a young, small light-haired man, whereas, Vanzetti is middle-aged,
dark, with a black moustache.
On the whole, the alibi for Vanzetti was overwhelming. Thirty-one
eyewitnesses testified positively that none of the men that they
saw in the murder was Vanzetti. Thirteen witnesses either testified
directly that Vanzetti was in Plymouth selling fish on the day of the
murder or furnished corroboration of such testimony.
* * * * *
Judge Thayer abandoned identification of Sacco and Vanzetti as the
grounds on which the jury’s verdict rested, in denying a motion
for a new trial. This motion was based on the discovery of a new
eyewitness with better opportunity for observation than any of the
other witnesses on either side, who swore that Sacco was not the man
in the car. Judge Thayer ruled that this evidence “would simply mean
one more piece of evidence of the same account and directed to the
same end, and in my judgment, would have no effect whatever on the
verdicts, for these verdicts _did not rest, in my judgment, upon the
testimony of eyewitnesses, for the defendants, as it was, called more
witnesses than the Commonwealth who testified that neither of the
defendants were in the bandit car_.[1]
“The evidence that affected the defendants, was circumstantial, and
was evidence that is known in law as ‘consciousness of guilt.’”
[Sidenote: II.