[NUMBERS IN BRACKETS ARE THE PAGE NUMBERS FROM THE ORIGINAL TRANSCRIPT]
[2376] Mr. Fisher: If it please
your Honor and ladies and gentlemen of the jury: I am fully cognizant of the
grave importance of the trial of this indictment. I appreciate truly how keen a
responsibility is mine. I shall humbly and in language as simple as I can
command give you briefly the facts and the circumstances upon which we rely to
gain for the defendant, Bruno Richard Hauptmann, an acquittal at your hands.
That is now our responsibility: The fair presentation of all the facts and
circumstances attendant to the trial of this indictment which we shall contend
will preserve the life and the liberty of this defendant.
[2377] Until these facts and circumstances
are fully proven, that responsibility continues to be his and ours. When we
have fully and completely presented all those facts and circumstances which we
feel are material to the proper presentation of this defense, then that
responsibility shifts, it is no longer mine, or that of my associates.
The responsibility for the life
and liberty of Hauptmann then becomes yours.
Now, let’s see what we are here
to defend. May I at this time read to you the indictment that we are called
upon to defend: “The grand inquest for the State of New Jersey in and for the
body of the County of Hunterdon upon their respective oaths present that Bruno
Richard Hauptmann on the first day of March in the year of Our Lord One
Thousand Nine Hundred and Thirty Two, with force and arms, at the Township of
East Amwell, in the County of Hunterdon aforesaid, and within the jurisdiction
of this court did willfully, feloniously and of his malice aforethought, kill
and murder Charles A. Lindbergh, Junior, contrary to the form of the statute in
such case made and provided and against the peace of the State, the Government
and the dignity of the same.”
Now, still having some doubt in
our minds as to what we were called upon to defend, under the phraseology of
that indictment, which, as a matter of fact follows the old common law form of
murder indictment, we caused to be served upon the State of New Jersey, through
their proper representative, the Attorney General, or [2378] the Prosecutor of
Hunterdon County, a demand that we be furnished with some particulars
specifying with more particularity just what the defendant Hauptmann was
accused of, and in response to that a motion was argued before his Honor in
this court room, answered on behalf of the State of New Jersey by Mr. Lanigan,
who sits at the State’s table, and I want to read for you now out of the
official record the questions and answers as submitted by Mr. Lanigan:
Question Number
1: Is it the intent of the indictment to allege that murder was committed with
premeditation and with malice aforethought Answer: The indictment is complete
and sufficient answer in that it states that Bruno Richard Hauptmann did willfully,
feloniously and of his malice aforethought kill and murder Charles A.
Lindbergh, Junior. Question Number 2: Is it the intent of the indictment to
allege that murder was committed while the indicted subject was engaged in the
commission of a felony? Question Number 3:—
Mr. Wilentz: Pardon me. If your
Honor please, I didn’t want to interrupt counsel, but the bill of particulars,
if your Honor please, I take it, is not a proper part of the opening.
The Court: Well, I believe—Mr.
Wilentz: It is evidence.
[2379] The Court: The answer to
the bill of particulars—
Mr. Fisher: Yes.
The Court: —would be proper for
consideration, but such bill, such demands as are not answered and not required
by the Court to be answered, I cannot see that they have any relevancy at all.
Mr. Fisher: I am attempting to
read, sir, the answers made by the Attorney General in his argument to the
Court in response, which became part of the official record, and I now have it
in my hand, sir.
The Court: Now, if that is
objected to, that will have to be excluded. My recollection is that it required
the State to make an answer, and I assume that the State made an answer. I have
never seen it, but I assume that I did. Now, if you want to read that, Mr.
Fisher, you may do so. If you want to read that into the record, you may do so.
Mr. Wilentz: The Prosecutor of
the Pleas, not Mr. Lanigan.
Mr. Fisher: I submit ladies and
gentlemen, that as the result of certain information we received in the
argument of the Assistant Attorney General in response to our demand for
particulars, we were apprised of certain salient facts in reference to the
indictment against our client Mr. Hauptmann. Among other things, it came [2380]
to our knowledge that the State relied and we are here now to answer the
indictment and the things they rely on in connection thereto, they relied upon
the fact that this defendant committed the crime of murder while engaged in the
commission of a felony in the County of Hunterdon and the State of New Jersey.
Now upon that state of facts we are here to answer. We submit that in our
defense we will attempt and we believe successfully to prove to you a complete
alibi for the defendant Hauptmann on each and every occasion that he has been
named as being present at a given point in the evidence thus far produced, and
I refer now particularly to March 1st, 1932, to April 2nd, 1932, and to
November 26th, 1932.
We believe that we will be able
to prove to you, to your satisfaction, that on the day, March the 1st, 1932,
the defendant Hauptmann, who stands accused of going into the silent home of
Colonel Lindbergh, and stealing and murdering the child of Lindbergh, in the
early morning of that day, took his kit of tools, as was his morning custom,
and went down into the City of New York for the purpose of procuring
employment.
And we shall ask you ladies and
gentlemen whether or not that is the action of a man who is to engage that very
night in such a nefarious crime as was committed.
We will follow him downtown for
you, to the agency; and from there to the job to which he was assigned. We will
account, by competent testimony, we will account by the testimony of the
defendant [2381] himself for his entire day and we will show that at the close
of the day he returned to his Bronx home—up, I believe, on 222nd or 223rd Street.
His wife, a frugal, hardworking
housewife, was employed in a baker shop or delicatessen store, lunchroom, or
whatever you desire to term it, of people named Frederickson; that the
defendant Hauptmann was obliged to call for her at least two nights a week
every week, for the reason that Mrs. Hauptmann didn’t keep her regular and
usual hours on those days. She was obliged to work late because of certain
facts which the evidence will disclose. And we will show that the defendant
Hauptmann did go to the baker shop of Frederickson, and at the very hour the
State charges he was climbing the ladder, which has been before you, he was in
the baker shop of Frederickson, sipping coffee, chatting with his wife; and we
will show that not only by Hauptmann and his wife, but by entirely
disinterested people who happened to drop in the shop.
Now, that is as to the night of
March 1st.
On the night of April 2nd, a very
easy night for Mr. Hauptmann to recall, because he is a German, from a part of
Germany where they are much given to parties and to music and to jollification
among themselves; they carry their foreign customs into this country with them.
It is true, you jurors know it is true if you have in your community people of
foreign extraction, you know that they cling tenaciously to their old world
customs; and so do the [2382] Germans in The Bronx, New York. And it has been
their custom since they have been in there, the Hauptmanns, and a few of their
German neighbors, to gather in a home of one or the other on the first Saturday
of each and every month, and to have a little party, a little music, a little
singing, a little chat or talk of the Homeland, talk of the Fatherland. And
they were, and we will show you by evidence other than the evidence of
Hauptmann, they were on the night of April 2nd in the home of Hauptmann in the
Bronx—
The Court: April 2nd?
Mr. Fisher: April 2nd, 1932, sir.
—in the home of Hauptmann in The
Bronx, together with a friend or perhaps more than one friend—I don’t recall at
the moment—as you or I might be with our friends on any given night; and that
the entire evening was spent there in that house, never once leaving the house.
Now, as to November 26th, 1934,
it is a significant thing that the witness Barr picked on one night about which
there can’t be a scintilla of doubt as to the whereabouts of the defendant
Hauptmann. It was an event in his life, that day; it was his birthday; it was
Hauptmann’s birthday,— November 26th was his birthday; and he gathered into his
home in The Bronx friends. Why, it is the custom—I don’t know how many of you
know Germany; if I may, for a moment, put in a personal word, I have traveled
through the country, [2383] I have walked through it, I have lived with the
peasants and people there. They are the greatest people in the world to observe
birthdays and national holidays. There is no nation like them for that sort of
thing. And in Hauptmann’s house in The Bronx on the 26th of November, at the
very hour Cecile Barr said from this witness stand he bought a ticket in a theater
down in Greenwich Village, some 15 or 20 miles from his home—he was at home,
the host of some friends present there, at his invitation, to honor his
birthday.
That is as to our alibi.
They are the three days, I
believe, on which the State has charged certain things occurred in the life of
Hauptmann which hook him up to this crime.
That is as to our alibi.
Now, as to handwriting: We shall
attempt to prove to you—not by sheer force of numbers as the State did, for a
very, very good reason; we are totally unable to procure, through financial
reasons, any such array of testimony as the State could produce here.
We will show you and show you
clearly that the funds of this man Hauptmann are completely and totally
exhausted. He is before you here in the court without one dollar that he can
call his own, without a penny in the world. And his defense has been almost
entirely financed through the members of his counsel.
And I say to you that we cannot
bring you here eight or nine or ten or twelve outstanding experts from the far
parts of the world. That cannot be done. We have [2384] no money to go down in
Los Angeles and bring Clark Sellers here.
Mr. Wilentz: Just a minute—
The Court: The defense is going a
good way. There is no doubt about that, Mr. Attorney General.
Mr. Fisher: I have California on
my mind, your Honor. I want to go down there.
The Court: I suppose it is
competent for him to state that he is without funds, that is, to have his man
say on the witness stand that he is without funds, if he can say so truthfully
and subject to cross examination, but I think you are going too far.
Mr. Fisher: Very good.
Mr. Wilentz: We except to this,
of course. We expect counsel to prove what he says in this regard.
The Court: Of course. The very
purpose of an opening is to state the facts which counsel expects to prove.
Mr. Wilentz: That is the reason
they haven’t got more handwriting experts, as I understand, is because of a
lack of funds—we expect them to prove that.
Mr. Fisher: We will go a step
further than that, ladies and gentlemen, we will [2385] prove that with what
little money we did have in the banks of New York City out of the funds of Mrs.
Anna Hauptmann put in there from 1924 to 1932, has been tied up by the State of
New Jersey, funds that couldn’t possibly have to do with this kidnapping and
that is another very cogent reason why we are here without funds, now that we
are here on the question of funds. I will say to you that we will prove that we
are without funds and for that reason necessarily limited and very severely
limited in the extent of testimony that we can produce before you, ladies and
gentlemen, but we will produce competent handwriting experts, who will take the
very exhibits put in evidence by the experts of the State of New Jersey and
show you clearly, and I am convinced, to a point where there can’t be a doubt
in any of your minds that that is not the handwriting of Bruno Richard
Hauptmann. It is not our business to prove whose it is; it is our business and
we will prove to you that it is not the writing of Bruno Richard Hauptmann.
We will prove it by witnesses
competent, I am sure you will agree with me when you have heard them testify. I
will say as to them that they will not be in such numbers as were presented by
the State, but competent witnesses whose testimony you can’t refuse to believe.
Now as to finances, as to
finances of the defendant Hauptmann, we will show you and we believe show you
clearly that the State of New Jersey has far overestimated the amount of money
they claim to have [2386] traced through the accounts of Bruno Richard
Hauptmann, in his name or in the names of some persons holding for him. It is
our contention and we believe it is borne out by the testimony thus far adduced,
and we will further it by testimony of our own, that as a matter of fact they
have traced something like ten to twelve thousand dollars from 1932 through to
the fall of 1934. What they attempted to do ladies and gentlemen, and the
records which you will take to the jury room will show you, is that they have
attempted to add repeat money. To make that perfectly clear, I want to say
this, we will show you and show you clearly that the defendant Hauptmann would
go into the bank and he would draw from the bank a hundred dollars or five
hundred dollars for a purpose which he might then have in mind, just as any one
of us if we were fortunate enough in these hard times to have that much money,
we might go to the bank and draw it out. It is human and a human frailty to
change your mind. He might change his mind the next day on the thing he
intended to use his money for, and we will prove this to be true, and he would
go back to the bank and put that same five hundred dollars in the bank, and
perhaps he would do that several times.
The great State of New Jersey has
attempted to prove to you by evidence that that is all fresh money coming out
of his pocket. We will prove to you, ladies and gentlemen, that such is not the
case. We will prove to you and we believe we have already proven it by the
State’s witnesses, [2387] that if you add the losses in his accounts and the
remainder of his accounts and add to that the mortgage that he took after 1932,
you have got all the money that Bruno Richard Hauptmann had except his bare
living expenses from the time April 1st, 1932, down to the present minute. Certainly
you will have to be convinced, if we prove to you what his total loss was, what
his total remainder was, what his outstanding investments now are, that you
must concede that to be the amount of money he has had. We will show you further
than that as to Hauptmann’s account, we will show you that he did deal and we
will conclusively prove this to you, that he did deal as partners with a man
named Isidor Fisch.
They were partners in two
different ways, two different lines of business, which is not unusual. They
engaged in two different enterprises. One was a business of buying and selling
and trading in the market, a very common practice, I assure you, as you
probably will know. The other was the buying and selling and trading in furs
and pelts. One business was handled by Hauptmann, the other business was
handled by Fisch. The fur end of the business we will prove to you was handled
by Fisch and he went out into this very country and we will show you into this
very country, and bought up furs of all sorts of fur bearing animals that are
used in the fur market. Hauptmann operated and maintained the brokerage
business, the brokerage account. He attended down at Steiner Rouse and the
customers’ rooms.
[2388] From time to time they put
in money or they took out money from their account, if the fur business showed
a profit, and it did show a very fine profit, and we will prove it to you—from
time to time they would draw out dividends from the fur business in cash, for
instance, if there would be a balance at the end of a month of perhaps $3,000,
they would divide two thousand of that and hold a thousand dollars for surplus
and capital.
This is all subject to proof, and
we will prove it to you. They would each of them take a thousand dollars’
dividend.
Now, in the market, if they
reached a point where Fisch’s account was overdrawn in the market, Fisch would
hand the help, on presentation of records, such money as was needed to balance
the account of Fisch with Hauptmann in the brokerage.
We will prove to you beyond a
shadow of a doubt that on numerous occasions Fisch would go into his clothes
and hand Hauptmann sufficient money to balance his, Fisch’s holding in the
market. Now, there is nothing unusual about that. We will prove to you beyond a
doubt that it is very common practice for one man to deal for another.
I do it every day. A number of
you people unquestionably have done it. It is not an unusual situation when you
have men who rely on each other and who trust each other and who believe in
each other.
Now, we will show you another
very significant thing. We will trace the family fortunes of the Hauptmanns
from the time they arrived in America. They are Ger- [2389] man people. They
are a very frugal people. Nationally the Germans are a very frugal people and
the Hauptmanns were especially saving and especially frugal, and that proof
rests in the bank book of the woman, Anna Hauptmann, showing deposits running
from $20 up to $80 out of her earnings during her early days in America.
Now, were they poverty stricken
people? Were they to be a charge on the town? We will prove to you that that is
not true. We will show you that as far back as 1927 these people had amassed
sufficient money to take a $3750 mortgage—and they had it. They had it in 1927.
We will show you that all through that period of time they had substantial bank
accounts.
We will show you that they saved
money that didn’t find its way to the banks, as so many foreign people do.
We will show you that they take
currency as currency and tuck it away in the house, saving against the day when
they wouldn’t be able to work and earn any further.
Now, we will prove to you, ladies
and gentlemen, that these people were not poverty stricken people, without a
dollar in the world. They were substantial citizens. They were working people,
who had the ability and the desire to accumulate their means against the day
when they could accumulate no more.
If we show you these facts, if we
prove to you that they were people of means prior to April 1932, if we prove to
you that they were saving, frugal people and show you their accounts, then we
will say to you, [2390] “We can see nothing unusual in the situation of the
accounts.”
Why, the proof is, and we will
further it, that this man dealt in margin.
Now, margin means you put up ten
per cent, perhaps, or 15 per cent of the amount you want to buy, and Hauptmann
could buy $1,000 worth of stock with $150 deposit.
And he could sell the same stock
the next day and buy it again. So that $150 deposit with a broker might show
bookkeeping moneys to the tune of, oh, any number of thousands of dollars, that
one little item.
And we think that has been pretty
clearly demonstrated to you, and we will further it with our own proof.
Now, we go down a way from the
money angle of the things, to come to the facts of the case in relation to the
placing of the defendant Hauptmann anywhere near the scene of the crime.
We will show you, and show you
clearly, that the witness Hochmuth is unreliable.
We believe, we will demonstrate
to you, that several years ago, when he was younger than he is now, he was
discharged from a position in New York because he suffered from hallucinations,
said hallucinations taking the form of people being after him, of seeing people
when there was nobody to see. We intend to make every effort to bring the man
here who; will testify to that. He is in New York, not subject to our subpoena,
but we will do our utmost, and we anticipate we will have him here. That we
apprehend will dispose conclusively and decisively of the witness Hochmuth; if
we show you that [2391] that witness was discharged from a position because he
was crazy on the subject of seeing people chasing him, then we won’t expect
that you will put much reliance on his identification of Hauptmann when he says
he saw him at the time he said he saw him there.
Now, to Whited: We will bring
you, ladies and gentlemen, witnesses who will testify that this man’s
reputation for veracity and truth never has been good. We believe we have shown
you a motive for his identification. We believe we showed it in his own
examination, why he put a man on the highway up there.
We intend further to show you,
and we believe we will be able to, that Whited never saw a single living soul,
such as he described, in the mountains in that February; and we will show it to
you by a man who worked side by side with him, every hour of every day, except
Sundays, in the month of February.
Now if we show you that, we shall
expect you to disregard Whited and disregard him completely.
As to the witness Rossiter, we
may show several interesting things about Rossiter, but we shall rely
principally on the fact that the physical evidence itself will disprove the
statements Rossiter made, and we will produce that evidence here. He described
a certain place that he saw the car, and the surrounding country; and we say to
you, ladies and gentlemen, and we will prove to you, that there is no such
physical surroundings as he has described.
Now there are the three witnesses
who [2392] have placed Hauptmann in New Jersey at any time in the world, and we
say to you if we do submit to you the facts as we relate them, proving them to
you, as I am now telling you we will, we shall expect you to disregard entirely
the testimony of these three witnesses.
As to the Alexander girl, we will
show you in regard to her that she testified from this stand that it was in the
middle of March she saw Dr. Condon in the station and saw Hauptmann looking at
him and she was interested because she knew Condon was the contact man in the Lindbergh
case.
We will prove to you beyond a
shadow of doubt that except for this particular matter, the fact that Jafsie,
who was Dr. Condon, was not known until the night of April, 1934, days and days
and days after she says she was watching these men, because she knew Condon was
the contact man in this case. We will prove to you that Hauptmann never was in
that station.
We think we may be able to prove
to you that Condon was never there.
Now if we do that, we certainly
shan’t expect you to place any credence in the testimony of that girl.
Now I want to come down for a
minute, if I may, to the manner of the conduct of the police in this case. I
want to show you what we will prove about it. We believe we will be able to
show you that no case in all history was as badly handled or as badly mangled
as this case, and we refer specifically to the witness Kelly and his testimony
about the ladder.
[2393] Now, after Kelly had
played around with that ladder—and we will prove this—for days and days and
days and couldn’t find a print of any kind or description, after he had gone
over the entire inside of the house and couldn’t find a print, even of the people
who put the baby to bed, they called in an expert, Dr. Hudson of New York City
and in the sight of Kelly, we will prove to you Hudson took off some 800 fingerprints.
Now, we will say to you and prove to you that the whole investigation was
conducted just about as thoroughly as that.
The ladder, we will prove to you
has been torn apart, put together and replaced and torn down again. The nails
have been drawn and were drawn and put back again. That ladder, we believe we
will show clearly, is in no more the condition than it was the day it was found
on the Lindbergh estate than that chair is in the condition the ladder is now.
Now, if we prove those facts,
ladies and gentlemen, they are essential facts in this case. If we show you
that that ladder has been so handled that it would be impossible now to
identify it accurately as the one which was found in the hills, then we shall
expect you to disregard all this testimony about the ladder.
We will also prove to you this
thing, that I consider vitally essential and vitally important in this case. We
will produce before you, we believe, the man who has always been considered by the
State Police of New Jersey to have been the last man and the only man to
actually see the man who did the kidnapping.
[2394] Now, that is a broad
statement, but we intend to prove it. We will produce before you a man who has
been used by the State continuously as a witness in this case to show the man
who was about a mile from the Lindbergh house at six o’clock at night on March
1st with a ladder on his way to the Lindbergh house.
We will show you further that man
has been in this very courtroom all through the State’s case and he hasn’t been
called. Now, if we produce a witness here, if we produce a witness here who will
swear under oath on that stand that he was along Lindbergh’s road on the night
of March 1st at six o’clock and he saw a man driving down in an automobile with
a ladder which he identifies as this ladder, and that man wasn’t Bruno Richard
Hauptmann, we expect you to consider that and consider it well in arriving at
your verdict.
Now, ladies and gentlemen, we
will submit this case to you as honestly and fairly as we know how.
Again may I say we will be
terribly handicapped by a total lack of funds. We are in no such position as is
the State in this case with the combined resources of the United States, the
State of New Jersey and the State of New York at their fingers’ tips.
We are here battling along with
our back to the wall, so far as financing goes, and we will prove that on this
witness stand, and we will do the very best we can. We will give you everything
we have got, everything we can get in this courtroom, by way of testimony. We
will hide nothing and [2395] produce everything and, when you have heard all
the testimony, we trust that if you are not already satisfied that the State of
New Jersey has utterly failed to make out a case against Bruno Richard Hauptmann,
we are quite sure you will be convinced, after you have heard such testimony
related as we will present.
Now, we will rely on you fully to
consider all the facts and circumstances and, having considered all the facts
and circumstances well, in conformity with your oath, we shall expect you to
retire to the jury room and to return and return promptly with a verdict
acquitting this man of the crime with which he is charged.
Thank you.
No comments:
Post a Comment