DAUGHERTY CASE

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 123, 20 November 1926, Page 8

DAUGHERTY CASE

JURY'S DISAGREEMENT MANY INVOLVED ISSUES HUGE COST INVOLVED. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SAN FBANCISCO, 20th Oct. The disagreement of the jury in the case of the ex-Attorney-General, H. M. Daugherty, and Colonel Thomas Miller, formerly alien property custodian at "Washington, illustrates anew the extreme difficulty of prosecuting Government cases, involving alleged conspiracy. The expense attaching to these trials is enormous. It is estimated that the present trial will cost Daugherty and Miller £10,000 each, which, in the case of the former, is about all the . Government claims can be traced to his account from the "fee" paid by German claimants in the American metali return. The evidence in the Daugherty was very confusing from the first. The, District Attorney, Mr. Buekner, wbo - has a national reputation in law, traced^ a convincing chain of circumstances in, . his opening statement to the jury,, as - well as in his address to the jury, but the actual testimony of the witnesses, involving among other things, a rather technical interpretation of somewhat' ambiguous Federal statutes, was enough1" to confuse the proverbial Philadelphia lawyer. It was, therefore, no surprise to many who followed the trial to hear that the jury could not agree. There was more than enough of the-element" of doubt to prove fatal to the Govern*' ment's claim. There was also the ele^' ment of circumstantial evidence to be " contended with. It is difficult to get' a verdict on a case of that sort in cri-'"' minal jurisprudence. The involvemqfttr; in the Daugherty and Miller caseer made agreement impossible, and th,e r Government will probably consider" carefully before applying for a new ' trial. _. ■ . '; CONFUSED MOEAL CODES . • The jury, which deliberated so long'" and so fruitlessly, was probably "'as1 * much confounded by the fcioral codes involved in-the case as was the nationalcapital confounded when the ownersof these codes made their descent -on-* Washington with the advent of. the" Harding administration. It was not al-" leged that the Government was actually: defrauded of any money, but that'it had been cheated of the "best ser-'1 vices" of the Attorney-General andthe alien property tustodian, due* to - the payment of fees by the claimants I—i fees which found their way into"thjr> bank accounts of Government officials. Evidently the moral code was that, | so long as the Government was not defrauded of its property and financial, rights, it was nobody's business what.. might be done "on the side," as the , saying here.is1 to describe moneys earn-.* ed in private time. The Daughertj^--defence contended from the beginning'"that the Morton claim of seven million dollars, which was paid on the author?.. ity of Daugherty and Miller, was, a,, just claim, and that the United States - paid back only the amount of property- ■ it had seized. If, under the circum»,.7 stances, the German claimants chose, .t0,,, pay certain sums for "influence" which expedited the claims, the people were robbed of none of their rights, and the claimants paid only what they expected to pay in the way of legitimate attorney fees. „■ ■ .