PERSISTING IN MISDEEDS
Every lane, the philosopher will tell you, has an ending. Mine stopped
abruptly. A check of mine was returned to the one who supposed me a
Carnegie. Having a good description of me, he lost no time in notifying
the police. Some ten weeks later, I walked into the arms of a waiting
policeman. I knew him well as an old friend of the family, and besought
him for their sakes to let me go. He couldn’t see it that way. Of
course he was sorry for me, and all that, but he had a duty to perform.
I put on as bold a front as I could as he led me to the nearest patrol
box. My impressions of that ride in the wagon are indistinct in my
memory. I do remember, however, the sensation of weight that seemed to
overwhelm me as I entered for the second time the station house. I was
held for trial and committed to jail until tried.
It was early summer and the courts had adjourned to meet again three
months hence. That time I must spend in jail, unless it were my
pleasure to plead guilty or unless I could arrange for bail. The latter
was out of the question; bail could not be had. Friends of the family
were unwilling to take the chance. Upon entering jail my mind was made
up to take my punishment at once and have it over with, but in jail I
met men older and abler in crime than I was, whose advice to me was
to demand a jury and take a chance. They reasoned with me that I had
everything to gain and nothing to lose by the experiment. I, of course,
took their advice.
A trial by jury gives a pretty good chance to the crook. It takes
mighty strong evidence, and it has to be very conclusive to send a man
away for a term of years, and the crook knows it. The worst that he’s
got is an even break, no matter what the evidence. If there’s a real
discrepancy in the testimony of the witnesses, a minor mistake in the
identification, it is a ten to one chance in his favor. The crook,
above all, knows men, knows how difficult it is to get twelve men to
agree on anything under the sun, and, other things being equal, is more
than willing to stack his liberty on the chance. In all my experience
in the underworld I know of no man wrongfully convicted. On the other
hand, I know of at least a hundred cases where the guilty have been
acquitted.
Of course I do not mean to say that my experience has been the rule,
but I am giving it for what it is worth. I myself was once tried for
an act which I knew absolutely nothing about. The evidence against me
seemed conclusive, my pals had all bidden me good-by, and I myself had
given up hope. I was without money to employ first-class counsel. The
State was represented by an attorney able in criminal prosecution, and
this made my chances look slim indeed. I had no witnesses to speak in
my favor. I went on the stand and told my story; I testified as only
truth can testify, and the jury acquitted me. My pals of the underworld
called me a lucky dog. Was I lucky? Was luck the dominant factor in
that acquittal? It may have been, but I have never believed it. I have
a conviction, born from I know not where, that the Providence that
guards the fool, the child, and the drunkard also throws a protecting
arm around the innocent.
I entered jail an amateur in crime and stayed there a little over
three months. In that time I learned more of the devious methods which
crooks use against society than I had ever dreamed of knowing. What a
commentary upon justice! What responsibility rests upon a State which
makes no provision for the separation of the young and old in crime!
I mingled daily with men grown old in the underworld; I assimilated
just as much of their vices as my immature nature would hold. I learned
the language of the crook. The tales told were strong with the flavor
of adventure. They fascinated me and I looked up to the old crooks as
men to be envied. Boy that I was, I knew nothing of their hidden life;
I knew nothing of the years spent behind prison walls, nothing of the
misery, sufferings, the heartaches such years entailed. Yes, I envied
them. They came to be heroes, as it were, out of the great book of
adventure.
The day of my trial finally arrived. I took particular pains to dress
well for the occasion. Appearance weighs largely in the prisoner’s
favor before judge and jury. The trial was brief, the evidence against
me conclusive, I could offer none in my favor. The jury retired, and
after over two hours deliberation arrived at the fact that I was indeed
guilty. I tell you, juries do some strange things and arrive at still
stranger conclusions. My sentence was pronounced immediately, and was
that I should be confined in the reform school until I reached the age
of twenty-one years.
As I look back over the years I can see clearly some of the steps that
led me over the line. Be it understood that I am making no excuses for
my numerous lapses of morality; I shall merely endeavor to trace some
of the causes which led me into the underworld.