SUMMATION BY MR. HAUCK
[NUMBERS IN BRACKETS ARE PAGE NUMBERS FROM
THE ORIGINAL RECORD ON APPEAL]
[4331] Mr. Hauck: May it please
the Court, ladies and gentlemen of the jury: I watched you ladies and gentlemen
in this courtroom day in and day out. You have listened to over a million and a
half words of testimony. You have watched some 380 exhibits to be entered in
this case. And I want to congratulate you, ladies and gentlemen. I want to
congratulate you for your patience, for the fact that you have sat here and
listened not only to the testimony but sometimes to the arguments of counsel. It is customary in criminal cases and
especially customary in Hunterdon County in criminal cases for the defense to
demand from the State what is known as an opening and it is my assignment as
Prosecutor [4332] of the Pleas in Hunterdon County to give this opening to you.
When the Grand Jury of Hunterdon
County indicted Bruno Richard Hauptmann for the murder of Charles A. Lindbergh,
Jr., the responsibility was mine to try that indictment. Realizing that I had a
very small staff and realizing that the expense would be great for the County
of Hunterdon, I went to the Attorney General and I requested his assistance and
he graciously accepted by taking charge of the prosecution of this case, and I
want to take this opportunity of thanking him and thanking his staff for the
splendid assistance they have given me.
Members of the Jury, the State of
New Jersey contends that they have proven in this case not only beyond a
reasonable doubt but conclusively and overwhelmingly that Bruno Richard
Hauptmann is guilty of murder in the first degree, that he is guilty of the
murder of the infant, Charles A. Lindbergh, Jr.
Colonel Lindbergh and Mrs.
Lindbergh left Englewood on the night preceding the kidnaping. They were
accompanied by their son. They came to Hunterdon County to their home in East
Amwell Township. At the home in East Amwell Township were Ollie Whateley and
Mrs. Whateley, Ollie Whateley acting as a butler and Mrs. Whateley as the
housekeeper.
It is important for the State of
New Jersey to prove in this case what is known as the corpus delicti. We have
proved that to you. We have proved the body of the child. We have proved that
the infant [4333] child, Charles A. Lindbergh, Junior, was murdered. We have
shown you by the testimony that that infant child was with his parents, Colonel
and Mrs. Lindbergh, at their home in East Amwell Township, and that in the
afternoon of March 1st it was a normal, active child, that it played, that it
talked, and that it walked; that it had toys and did all those things that my
little children do, and all those things that your children have done at the
age of twenty months.
We further showed you by the
testimony that in the afternoon of March 1st, in response to a telephone call,
Miss Betty Gow, the child’s nurse, arrived at the Lindbergh home. When she
arrived there, because of the fact that the child had a cold, she prepared an
extra little garment. She took some material, some material that had a
scalloped edge, and she fashioned a little shirt, and she borrowed some thread,
some colored thread, green or blue, whatever it was, and she fashioned this
little garment to put on the chest of that child; and we have shown you that
that child was clothed with that garment, that it had an additional little
shirt, and it had over it a one-piece sleeping garment. And then you heard the
testimony of Mrs. Lindbergh, how on that very afternoon she walked around the
window, under that southeast window in the baby’s nursery, and she threw a
pebble up at the window, and the child looked out of the window, and she waved
to it, talked to it, and then how, that very evening, she and Miss Gow prepared
the baby for bed; how that southeast window [4334] was shut, the shutters were
closed and how the room was prepared, and Miss Gow told you that the baby was
fastened in the crib by the covers being pinned down to the mattress and she
rubbed a little Vick’s Vaporub on its chest and gave it a slight physic because
of the fact that it had the cold. Now at eight o’clock Miss Gow said she looked
at her watch as she left the room and she went downstairs and she had something
to eat. Colonel Lindbergh and Mrs. Lindbergh were downstairs and upstairs in
the room adjoining the baby’s room. At about ten o’clock she went back up into
the room to see how the baby was and as she got up in the room, she didn’t
light the light at first, she left the door open and the light came in from the
hall and she walked into the room and she connected the electric heater, walked
over to the crib, listened for the baby’s breathing.
And you remember how she
testified the baby wasn’t there. Then she testified how she went into Mrs.
Lindbergh’s room and she said to Mrs. Lindbergh, “Have you the baby?” and she
said, “No,” and she said, “Where is the Colonel?” He was downstairs, that she
was going down to see if the Colonel had the baby.
And then the testimony was that
she went downstairs and she asked Colonel Lindbergh and Colonel Lindbergh said,
“Why, no. Isn’t the baby in its crib?” And he ran upstairs with Miss Gow and he
rushed into the baby’s room and then he rushed into a closet and he grabbed a
rifle and he ran into his wife’s room and he said, “Anne, they have stolen our
baby.”
[4335] Then the testimony shows
that while Colonel Lindbergh and Ollie Whateley were out in the woods searching
for the baby, that those three women went downstairs, the mother, the nurse and
the housekeeper, and there they remained silent in prayer, hoping that all
would be well. But, it was only a short time after when that baby’s body was
found on the road to Mount Rose.
Now ladies and gentlemen of the
jury, we have further shown you in this case that the infant child, Charles A.
Lindbergh, Jr., was forcibly taken from his crib. Miss Gow testified that the
covers were pinned to the mattress. Further we have the fact that it was a very
short distance from the top of the blankets to the head of the crib, which
showed and which was proof that the baby must have been yanked from that crib
forcibly and the fact that when she went in the room, when Colonel Lindbergh
went in the room after the baby was taken, that the covers still bore the impression
of that little body.
Furthermore, at the very outside
of the building, right below the southeast window of that nursery, was first a
footprint and alongside of the footprint was the double marks of the bottom of
the very ladder that you see in this courtroom, and that ladder was placed, the
two sections of it by the officers in an experiment, the bottom placed in those
self-same ladder marks and the testimony was that where the top of the ladder touched
the building 30 inches below the window, there were marks from wood from the
ladder on the side of the building.
[4336] Furthermore, the ladder
was broken, and we have further proof that inside of that window on the window
sill was a ransom note; on the window sill was a mud print, on the suitcase
belonging to Colonel Lindbergh beneath the window was another mud print;
alongside of the suitcase was another mud print, and that the mud print led
from that very window over toward the crib in which the baby had been placed by
Betty Gow—all of which is definite, conclusive, overwhelming proof that that
body was forcibly taken from its crib by the defendant.
Then on May 12th we have the
finding of the body of the child. It was Colonel Lindbergh’s child. Colonel
Lindbergh and Betty Gow positively identified that child as Charles A.
Lindbergh, Jr. Furthermore, the garments were compared. The garments were
identified by Mrs. Lindbergh, by Mrs. Whateley, and also by Miss Gow. There is
no dispute on this point because counsel for the defense stood up in this court
and said, “We do not dispute the fact that this was the child of Colonel
Lindbergh that was found. It is sufficient when Colonel Lindbergh states in
this court that that was his child.”
Ladies and gentlemen, instead of
reviewing these facts, it would have been possible for me to have taken the
Attorney General’s opening as he gave it to you. I could have taken that
opening and said, instead, as he said, “We will prove to you,” or “We will show
to you,”—we have proved to you, or we have shown you. At this time I want to
challenge defense [4337] counsel, to show you, the members of the jury, a
single statement in the Attorney General’s opening that we have failed to prove
conclusively.
Now let me pass to the cause of
the death of the child. Dr. Mitchell, the County Physician, testified that the
child died from a fractured skull, and the fractured skull was of such an
extent that it caused instantaneous death. It wasn’t a mere blow. It was a
severe blow. And we have proved to you that that baby was killed by the fall
from that ladder. We have shown you that that very ladder was found on the
Lindbergh premises and that, by an experiment, when that ladder was placed next
to the Lindbergh home, the marks of the broken ladder left marks against the
building.
We had an experiment performed,
and it was so testified in this court, to show that a man went up the ladder
and on the way down, with the bundle in his arm, the ladder broke, in exactly
the same place as this ladder broke with the defendant, Bruno Richard
Hauptmann, on it. And we have proved to you conclusively that that fall caused
the baby’s death when it received the fractured skull, which was of such an extent
that it caused instantaneous death.
Furthermore, we have proved that
Colonel Lindbergh sitting in his home that very night at about 9:10 heard a
crash. He thought at first that it was the crash of some crate out in the
kitchen, but you can infer that that crash that Colonel Lindbergh heard was the
very crashing of that very ladder outside of the nursery win- [4338] dow. There
is further proof that this child died instantaneously. Betty Gow testified that
out in the driveway on the Lindbergh estate in the County of Hunterdon she
found a thumb guard sometime afterward. She testified that that metal thumb guard
was fastened over the finger and that it was tied by her securely in a knot
over the sleeping garment, and that it would be impossible to remove that thumb
guard without yanking off the sleeping garment from the child; and you can
infer that the defendant in leaving the premises with the child, in order to
have in his possession identification, the baby’s sleeping garment, realizing
that the baby was dead, yanked that garment off the baby and at that time that
thumb guard was dropped on the premises. And he did do that because of the fact
that he needed that garment, and he did have that garment, and he returned that
garment, and in return for the garment received $50,000 of Colonel Lindbergh’s
money.
Now, members of the jury, it is
necessary for the State of New Jersey in this case to prove one of two things,
that either the blow which was inflicted on this baby was inflicted in the
County of Hunterdon, or else that death ensued in the County of Hunterdon. We
have proved both to you. We have proved first that the blow was inflicted by
the fall from the ladder, and secondly that death ensued immediately, by the
doctor’s testimony, both having occurred in the County of Hunterdon. Further
proof of this, as I have already men- [4339] tioned, is the yanking of the
sleeping garment. But there is another thing. If you will remember the
testimony, where the baby’s body was found, and you can easily infer with the
testimony that after that little curly headed baby’s garment was yanked from
the body and the thumb guard was dropped, that he hurried on to his car, and
when he got in his car you can assume by the testimony that the defendant
wouldn’t dare to stop to dispose of the baby’s body near the Lindbergh estate,
an alarm might be given, he might be caught; and then as he drove on toward his
home in the Bronx, toward Hopewell, that houses became thicker and thicker,
cars might be around, people, so that he couldn’t dispose of the body there;
but it was not until he had passed the school, until he had passed the
orphanage asylum, until he found the first safe and convenient place from the
Lindbergh home, and it was there on Mount Rose Road that he went in from the
road, into the woods, which was thick with undergrowth, and there hurriedly
scooped a grave and hurried on to the Bronx. And that is proof that the baby
died on the premises, because if the baby died elsewhere it wouldn’t be buried
so near the Lindbergh home. I want you to keep that in mind.
Now it is the contention of the
State in this case that Charles A. Lindbergh, Jr., was killed in the commission
of a burglary. You might say to me, “What is a burglary?” And my answer will be
this: A burglary is the unlawful breaking and entering of a dwelling house in
the night time [4540] with the intent to either commit a battery or with the
intent to steal. This was in the night time; it was between 8 p. m. and 10 p.
m., it was 9:10 p. m. It was the dwelling house of Colonel Lindbergh and his
family. There was a breaking and entering. The testimony that I have already
covered, the fact that when the baby was put to bed, pinned in its crib, the
window was shut, the shutters were fastened, and when they went into the room
again the shutters were open and at the very foot of that window were the marks
of a ladder, that that ladder was broken, that there was a foot print on the
outside, and that in the inside was a note, the mud prints, the mud print on
the window sill, the mud print on the suit case, and the mud prints that led
over to that baby’s crib—all evidence, perfect evidence, of a breaking and
entering. And then we showed you an experiment also, how it was possible it was
done by a man going up the ladder, then came out the window with the bundle and
the ladder broke; as the ladder did break this crime was committed.
Now, what about the intent? We
say that this defendant had both intents: that he had the intent to commit a
battery; he had intent to commit a battery when he forcibly yanked the infant,
Charles A. Lindbergh, Jr., from the crib. We also say that he had the intent to
steal, and he did steal. He stole the baby’s sleeping garments and he stole the
baby. And the proof that he stole the baby’s sleeping garment is the fact that
that garment was yanked off it at the lane, and the fact that the person that
left the very original ran- [4341] som note in that window turned that very
sleeping garment over to Dr. Condon to receive $50,000 of Colonel Lindbergh’s
money. Isn’t that an intent to steal, intent to commit a battery?
Now, you might say to me—and I
will say to you, Bruno Richard Hauptmann, who sits in this very court room, did
all of these things. We have proved conclusively and overwhelmingly that he has
done these things. We have first shown you by the evidence, by the testimony,
that Bruno Richard Hauptmann planned this crime a long time.
The ransom note found in the
window sill said, “We planned this for a year,” words to that effect.
Not only that, but we showed you
that he watched the Lindbergh home. We brought the witness Whited here, a Hunterdon
County resident, who came in this court room and testified that he saw that man
(pointing), and he pointed that man out—about February 19th and about February
27th, near the Lindbergh estate, five or six feet away from him, and that
witness didn’t come to us and tell a story in 1934 and 1935, but he described
that very man the very next morning after the baby was taken from its crib.
Before the kidnaping this was;
before the murder of that child. And then we have the witness Rossiter, on the
Saturday before the kidnaping, he told how he was driving by the Princeton
Airport and he saw a car and a man by the car, and he saw some man in distress,
and he got out [4342] of his car and he went over to help him and he looked at
that man and watched him from three to five minutes, and he identified that man
as Bruno Richard Hauptmann. This was before the kidnaping, before the murder.
This is proof that he planned and
he plotted this very crime which he committed.
The Attorney General in his
opening said something about a ladder, that we would show to you that there was
a ladder found on the premises—and there is a ladder. You have heard that
ladder discussed. We have brought into this court room a man by the name of
Koehler.
Mr. Koehler gave the most
wonderful testimony that I have ever heard. He came into this courtroom and he
told you how, for months and months, over a period of a year and a half, before
anybody ever knew of Bruno Richard Hauptmann, he went from mill to mill, to
mill, and he tried to trace this lumber.
Finally he went down to Senator
Dorn’s Mill, and he found that they had a machine down there and that this machine had three sets of pulleys, that
lumber of the same size of the rungs of that very ladder was planed by that
machine.
He found out that there were
three shipments from that mill; that the first shipment was lumber cut with one
pulley, that the middle shipment was the lumber cut by the makeshift pulley,
and that the last shipment was made by a plane using a different sized pulley.
But the middle shipment, the lumber planed by the plane with the makeshift
pulley, was the only [4343] lumber that made certain marks on the lumber, the
same kind of lumber as that found in that ladder. He traced that lumber.
Senator Dorn said he saw the carload leave his mill. Then we brought a man here
from the lumber dealer. He said that he received that car. Then we traced that
car into the very neighborhood in which the defend-ant, Bruno Richard
Hauptmann, lived, to the National Millwork & Lumber Company. But that isn’t
all. We showed you that the defendant Bruno Richard Hauptmann not only worked
in that very lumber yard, but also that he purchased lumber from that very
lumber yard in December, 1931, and that Mr. Koehler found a piece of similar
lumber in that lumber yard as part of a bin.
And remember this: that all of
this was done a year and a half before the arrest of Mr. Bruno Hauptmann.
Nobody knew of Bruno Richard Hauptmann
at that time in connection with this case.
Then we took you into this man’s
attic. We had Mr. Rauch, the owner of the house, here; and he told you how the
attic had all its boards intact on the floor; that the board that was later
shown to be missing was originally part of the ladder.
And then we brought Mr. Koehler
here again on the stand, and he took the board from the attic, Exhibit S-226,
and he took the rail of the top section of that ladder, and he laid them out
here before you—silent testimony; testimony that couldn’t lie—and he showed you
many things. He [4344] showed you, first, that in the ladder rail were four
holes.
And he showed you how they took
that very board and placed it over the holes in the joists and that the nails
fitted in the holes; and we showed you by photographs that these holes were in
the ladder when the ladder was found. The photographs were taken March 8th,
1932, long before the time Bruno Richard Hauptmann was ever arrested, long
before anybody knew about his attic.
He also showed you and stated
positively that that board found in the attic was at one time connected with
the rail No. 16 of the ladder found in the Lindbergh home. He showed you the
sawdust; he showed you the knots and he showed you the grains and he brought
here his photographs, mute evidence of truth. But that is not all we showed you
about that ladder, ladies and gentlemen, we showed you that this very
defendant, Bruno Richard Hauptmann, had a plane among his tools, his carpenter
tools, and we showed you by the evidence that that very plane was used in
planing this ladder. The marks were shown on the tracings of the paper.
We also show you that there was a
chisel found on the Lindbergh premises; that there was a chisel of this size
missing from the kit of carpenter tools of Bruno Richard Hauptmann the very
sized chisel that was found on the premises. Mr. Koehler testified that a
chisel of that size was used in cutting out the notches for the rungs in the
ladder, and if you go [4345] to his set of tools you will find another chisel
of the identical make, and very same kind of a chisel as was found and left on
the Lindbergh premises.
Furthermore, Mr. Koehler
testified that there were clamps found in the tool chest that could have been
used to hold these boards together when they were sawed. He further testified
that he had sawed with his tools, saw cuts similar to those saw cuts.
But there is more evidence that
spells out to the very world Hauptmann, Hauptmann, in this case, and I am going
to turn to the ransom notes. There were several ransom notes in this case. The
first note was a ransom note that was left by the murderer of this child on the
very window sill of that room. The next note was mailed to Colonel Lindbergh,
and the next note was mailed to Colonel Breckinridge, and the rest of the notes
were either delivered or mailed to Dr. Condon.
We have proved to you
conclusively, overwhelmingly, that the writer of the first note was the writer
of all the notes. All the symbols were similar, and the elder Osborn testified
and showed you by his device that the little punch holes showed, when they were
held up together, that all these holes had the same space between them, and
between the edge of the paper and the hole nearest the edge of the paper.
Furthermore, we showed you that
the wording was similar, similar statements in different notes. We showed you
by the experts and by the notes themselves, that one note would refer to
another note, just like [4346] a history, reading from the first note to the
very receipt of $50,000 that was handed by Dr. Condon to the defendant, Bruno
Richard Hauptmann.
We have further shown you that
the paper of note Number 1, left on the window sill, and the paper of the
second note, was the same identical sheet of paper that had been torn apart and
one piece used to write the original note, and the second piece used to write
the second note. And we have shown you conclusively that the writer of every
single one of these notes was the defendant, Bruno Richard Hauptmann.
I am not going over all the
experts’ testimony in this case. It would take me all day. But we brought
experts from all over, all over the United States, some from the East, some
from the South, some from the Middle-West, and a man from the far West,
including a Government expert—you heard their testimony, you saw their exhibits—to
prove that the writer of all these notes was Bruno Richard Hauptmann. They
showed you the misspelling, they showed you the similarities, they showed you
the dissimilarities, they showed you the use of certain words, they showed you
the peculiar “X” in the “Bronx,” they showed you the lack of the crossing of
the t’s, the lack of the dotting of the i’s, hundreds of other similarities and
dissimilarities, the spelling of the word “boad”; and then the witness Sellers
did this: He took from the ransom notes certain letters and he arranged them on
the chart, so that you could see the signature of Bruno Richard Haupt- [4347] man,
which was so real that Bruno Richard Hauptmann could have written that signature
on the chart —mute evidence that shouts out Bruno Richard Hauptmann in this
case.
And then we have the sleeping
garment. One of the notes said, “I will deliver the sleeping garment to you,”—words
to that effect. This very sleeping garment that was put on that child the night
of March the 1st was delivered by the writer of the note, by Bruno Richard
Hauptmann, to Dr. Condon, the very sleeping garment. Mrs. Lindbergh said, “This
is the sleeping garment,” and told where she purchased it.
Every bit of this evidence
connects Bruno Richard Hauptmann with the murder of the infant Charles
Lindbergh, Jr.
But we have more than that in
connection with the actual kidnaping and murder. We have the witness Hochmuth,
the old man that stood on cross examination, the old man that on the very late
morning of March 1st, the day of the murder, said he was on his porch and a car
drove around the corner too fast and almost went in the ditch and the car
stopped; and in that car was a ladder and the man’s face grew red, and the man
stared at him, and he identified Bruno Richard Hauptmann. He said, “Those eyes.”
And then another witness came in
court, a defense witness—Lupica—the former Princeton student. Lupica said the
very night of the kidnaping, at the end of the Lindbergh lane he saw a man in a
Dodge automobile of dark color, and in that car was a ladder which he
afterwards saw in [4348] the Lindbergh premises; and he said that that man
resembled Bruno Richard Hauptmann—their witness.
Now, all these things connect
Bruno Richard Hauptmann with the kidnaping. They have shown and proved to you
conclusively that Bruno Richard Hauptmann was the murderer of the infant child,
Charles Lindbergh, Jr.
But there is more—reams of
testimony, days of evidence.
Then we brought the witness, Mrs.
Achenbach, the neighbor woman. And Mrs. Achenbach said that a day or two after
the kidnaping the defendant and his wife came to her home; that he limped and
his wife said that he had had a fall.
Then we brought Miss Alexander
here. Miss Alexander said she saw Bruno Richard Hauptmann—identified
him—watching Dr. Condon in a railroad station, testimony that hasn’t been
denied, during the negotiation of the ransom in the Bronx.
But there is more than that even.
There is another silent witness that shouts out, and that is that board that
was taken from the closet of Bruno Hauptmann’s home, a board on which is not
only the address of Dr. Condon, but Dr. Condon’s original telephone number, a
board in the writing of Bruno Richard Hauptmann which, under oath in the Bronx,
he said was his, a board that wasn’t out where the whole world could see it,
but was in the closet of Bruno Richard Hauptmann’s home.
But that isn’t all.
Then we have Dr. Condon, Dr.
Condon, the man who was for fifty years or more a [4349] teacher, Dr. Condon,
the man who was willing to give his time, who was willing to give his money,
who was willing to give his very life so that the child could be returned to
its parents, the man who went up and down the country. What did Dr. Condon say?
Dr. Condon said: Bruno Richard Hauptmann
was the man that jumped off the fence in Woodlawn Cemetery; Bruno Richard
Hauptmann was the man that he sat an hour and twenty minutes next to on a bench
across the street; and Bruno Richard Hauptmann was the man to whom he handed
$50,000 of Colonel Lindbergh’s money; the man that gave him a receipt in the
same writing—an hour and twenty minutes next to him on the bench. And he said
the defendant Bruno Richard Hauptmann was the “John.”
Then comes more testimony:
Perrone the taxi driver, Perrone the man that was sitting in his taxicab when
he says the defendant came up to him and said, “Take this note to this address.”
He came into this courtroom and said, “That is the man that gave me the note,”
written in the same handwriting, proved by the experts, “which I took to Dr.
Condon.” Another witness.
Then we have more testimony.
Colonel Lindbergh testified that on the night of April the 2nd when he went to
St. Raymond’s Cemetery and he sat in the car, he heard a voice, and the voice
called “Hey Docteur!” And he said the same voice that he heard in that cemetery
was the voice of Bruno Richard Hauptmann.
[4350] You who have heard that
voice on the stand here would never forget it.
Then there is something else in
this case: Bruno Richard Hauptmann lived in the Bronx. St. Raymond’s Cemetery
was in the Bronx. Woodlawn Cemetery was in the Bronx. The money was found in a
garage in the Bronx—everything in the Bronx. The National Millwork & Lumber
Company was in the Bronx, where this very defendant lived all during these
negotiations.
Now you can disregard the
personal identity, disregard the handwriting experts, disregard Whited,
disregard the ladder, disregard Lupica, disregard all those things, but I want
you to remember this: that the man who got the $50,000 handed to him was the
man who had buried in his very garage approximately $15,000 of this very money,
buried not in a shallow grave, like the Lindbergh baby was buried, along Mount
Rose Road, but buried in a garage, in a can behind a beam—Bruno Richard
Hauptmann.
And it was Bruno Richard
Hauptmann that wrote these notes; it was Bruno Richard Hauptmann that wrote the
notes that said to build a box of certain dimensions; and the notes instructed
them what to do, to go to this place and look under a stone and find another
note, and do this and do that—the defendant Hauptmann. And remember this,
remember that at the bot-tom of some of these notes appeared the word “singnature,”
“singnature,” and as soon as Bruno Richard Hauptmann received the $50,000 from
Dr. Condon, what [4351] happened? No more notes, no more notes sent, no more
notes received—the notes stopped; furthermore, the baby was dead and the writer
of those notes, the defendant, knew the baby was dead at the time he accepted
$50,000 and turned over the receipt in the cemetery.
Furthermore, we have proved to
you conclusively and overwhelmingly that this man had every bit of the $50,000.
We brought a Government man in here and had figured, figures that don’t lie;
figures of his brokerage accounts; figures of his banking account; figures of
his mortgages; figures out of his own diary, out of his own book, and we showed
you by his own statements and by this testimony that he received approximately
$50,000 that he couldn’t account for, try as he did—couldn’t account for.
And here is another thing: the
very day that the $50,000 was paid over in the cemetery, that very day, April
2nd, this defendant resigned from his job, didn’t work anymore, became a
gentleman of leisure—became a stock broker: the day the $50,000 was paid over.
Then we come down to his arrest.
The arrest sounds almost like fiction.
President Roosevelt had called us
off the gold standard, they were calling in all the gold-back bills and the
gold certificates. The banks and the police and the grocery stores and the
gasoline stations and everybody were watching for Lindbergh ransom bills. Lists
were printed and sent out. And suddenly one day in September the defend- [4352]
ant Bruno Richard Hauptmann went to a gas station near his home and purchased
some gasoline, and he gave a bill, and the attendant, Mr. Lyle, was wide awake,
and he asked him about it. And he said, “Oh, I have a hundred more of those
home,”—words to that effect. And the attendant wrote on the man’s license
number and it went to a bank and the bank looked at it and the bank called the
police and they checked up and found that Bruno Richard Hauptmann was the man
that owned this car. And then they trailed him, they followed him and suddenly
they closed in on him and when they picked him up he had another ransom bill
right in the very pocket of his clothing in a wallet. More evidence, this very
money in his pocket. Then he testified, he admitted that he used another one of
these bills to buy a pair of shoes for his wife and then when they took the man
to his house they looked through his house and couldn’t find anything. They
took him to the police station, and they were suspicious of his garage because
he was looking out the window at his garage, and they said to him, “Have you
got any money in the garage?” And he said, “No.” But they dug around in his
garage and they found first over $13,000. They went to the defendant and they
said, “What about this?” And he said, “Yes, it is Lindbergh money, but it’s all
I have got.” And then they went back again and they dug around again, and they
found the board, and in the board was $840 more with a little pistol and he
said, “Yes, that’s with it, too, but [4353] that’s all there is.” And then he
told them the Fisch story, how Fisch gave him a box and he put it up in the
closet on a shelf and it leaked and he put it out there to dry. But we brought
a witness in this court room who proved to you that Bruno Richard Hauptmann
passed one of these bills at a theater long before Fisch ever left this
country.
Then we showed you his brokerage
accounts, how he gambled with these moneys, moneys, and we showed you more than
that—the man that stopped work on April the 2nd, 1932, how he spent money. He
took a trip to Florida, he sent his wife to Europe, he bought a $400 radio, he
bought a shot gun, he bought a pair of field glasses for $125. He bought his
wife lots of dresses. He went on hunting trips—the man that didn’t work from
April the 2nd, 1932, except an odd job now and then, and the man that
consistently lost money in the Stock Market in New York City, Bruno Richard
Hauptmann.
Now, there is more than that to
this case that ties Bruno Richard Hauptmann and you can consider this: his
guilty conscience, the fact that when he was arrested he tried to disguise his
handwriting, the fact that when they asked him if he wanted a lawyer, he said, “Oh,
what’s the use!” His attitude on the stand, his misstatement, and his lies and
his lies, and his lies, here and in The Bronx.
Now, ladies and gentlemen, I
could go on all day, but the Attorney General will give the main summation and
he will answer Mr. Reilly, all the statements that he [4354] tells you in this
courtroom; but before sitting down I want to say one thing to you, and that is
this: this testimony has been presented to you by over a hundred people,
God-fearing, honest, truthful people, who came to here in behalf of the State
of New Jersey.
I watched you people sworn in, I
watched your names drawn out of the box, and I watched you take your oaths, and
I know that you have a duty and that you have an obligation; and when I was
sworn as Prosecutor of the Pleas of Hunterdon County I was given a duty by the
Governor of the State and by my office, and that duty, among other things, was
to try fairly the defendant, Bruno Richard Hauptmann; and as Prosecutor of the
Pleas I am going to insist that you members of the jury perform your duty the
same as I have performed my duty; and when the oratory of Mr. Reilly has left
your ears, and when the sympathy that covers your heart has been brushed, and
when you go in the room to deliberate, I am going to ask you to remember that
the responsibility of the State of New Jersey has then ended, and the
responsibility is then yours to weigh the evidence and bring in a verdict in
this case.
And I am going to say this in
closing: Remember, we are not required to have a picture of this man coming
down the ladder with the Lindbergh baby; but we have shown you conclusively,
overwhelmingly, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Bruno Richard Hauptznann is
guilty of the murder of Charles A. Lindbergh, Jr.
Thank you.
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