PRISONER RELEASED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 249, 21 October 1933, Page 4 (Supplement)

PRISONER RELEASED.

OLD .CRIME RECALLED. TRIED TO KILL SLAYER. Friendless, old before his time, with grey hair and tottering footsteps, the tiffin who tried to kill a Murderer is now roaming the by-ways of Georgia seeking help and rest where i*. may be found. William Green was one o<. the central figures' in an amazing drama of nearly 20 years ago that cost the life qf a young girl, caused a racial feud and split Georgia for years; ruined the career ot the Govei-nor; and resulted in a lynching. William Green was the man who tried, in prison, to kill Leo Frank, a young Jew sentenced for life for the murder of a fourteen-year-old employee. When, nearly 20 years ago, Frank, a university man and the manager of a pencil factory at Atlanta, was charged with the murder of the girl, all the Jews of New York rushed to his assistance by subscribing an enormous fund for his defence. Despite their efforts, however, Frank was sentenced to death, and when tho Governor commuted the sentence to life imprisonment the anti-Jew element of Georgia nearly tore liira limb from limb. Martial law had to be declared, and troops called out to save the Governor's life, but his career was ruined. Still, Frank was not allowed to get away with it. In 1013 Green attacked him with a knife in prison, and only after weeks of effort were the doctors able to save his life. Racial feeling in the case still ran high; and not long after Green's murderous attack, a mob raided the prison, carried Frank off, and lynched him near the home of the murdered girl.