BUTLER IN CUSTODY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 10427, 27 April 1897, Page 5

BUTLER IN CUSTODY.

HIS TREATMENT UNDER ARREST.

BY ONLOOKER.

I do not believe thab any prisoner accused of the grave crime of murder, to say nothing of a series of murders, or for that matter a prisoner accused of the pettiest of petty larcenies, was ever permitted by British police officials the liberty of receiving visitors, of chatting and smoking and drinking with them, or being sketched and photographed and interviewed and questioned about his guilt or innocence that was allowed Butler, the alleged perpetrator of the now notorious Glenbrook murders, during the time the mail steamer M&riposa, on which he was on board, remained in this port. Nothing like the scenes which took place in the cabin cell of the accused man has, I venture to say, ever been witnessed before outside the United States, where those who live in gaols live in glass bouses, and to be placed under arrest on a charge sufficiently grave or scandalous or sensational, is to become accessible to all men and women of idle curiosity and morbid tastes. Every notorious criminal in that country before hia conviction is elevated almost to the position of a popular hero. Reporters haunt hie cell day and nighb to record bis most trivial utterances, to describe what he eats, what he reads, how he droaaos, and whether he cleans his teeth or parts his bair in the middle. There is no personal particular too minute or too ridiculously commonplace for these industrious agents of the press to chronicle Self-invited visitors come at all hours bearing offerings of choice fruit, exquisite flowers, wines of the costliest, cigars the most fragrant. Hβ holds a daily levee as if ho were a ruling monarch instead - of a vulgar, uneducated, unintoresting murderer, or forgorer, or bigamist. Even, as in Butler's oaee, women oarried away by hyscorical feelings and euper-morbidnees, offer themselves in marriage. The greater the criminal the greater the rage for him. Men and women and struggle in their eagerness to catch a glimpse of him or to speak to him or to lay their gifts of good things at his feet. Many dollars were given by some enthusiastic San Franciscan for Butler's old boots, and his hat is treasured as a prize to be proud of in some home in the mad and motley city of the Golden Gate. All this is distinctly and peculiarly American. Ib is one of the most objectionable characteristics of American life—this disgusting apotheosis of crime and criminals, this fuss which is always made over greab offenders, and the craze which takes possession of so large a number of the community for tho man or woman charged with some deed of bloodshed.

It was so in Butler's case when arroitod in San Francisco. His Crimea or supposed crimes, for he has yet to be tried for thorn, were in everybody's mouth. Ho became the craze. Hundrede visited him daily. Ho was the most talked aboub man in the city. Women went mad over him. Crowds clamoured for his autograph at a dollar a piece. His cell was filled with presents. Yet there was nothing in the man's personal appearanco or history to create this morbid emotion. He was ordinary to the point of repulsivenoss, and of his pasb nothing was known. He had arrived in the Swanhilda as a common sailor. He did not look any different to the othor occupants of the fo'caeble. But

common-looking though ho was thero wa tho mystery and fascination of crimi enveloping this eoanmn. Uβ was accused o a series of murders— sordid, comnionplaci murders, it is true—and tliab was enougl to stir tho imagination and feelings of t eection of tho people of San Francisco, anc to place him there and thon uponapedeata where all who ohoae to look mijrhb behold him, and whore he was at liberty to pose in tho eight of all men as ho deemed fit. But one was not prepared to find thest American methods imported into thi colonics with Butler. To no one, I bo lieve, was it a greater surprise to find how iasy it was to get an interview with Butloi :han to the Colonial prossmen thenuelves, Efforts had beon made by some of the Sydney newspapers to obtain a permit rom the New South Wales Minister oi lustice to allow their representative to see ,nd talk with Butler. I do not know rhetber they were successful or not. So ar as I am aware, nono of the journalists rho were sent over from Sydney to meed he Mariposa had such an authority. 1 ;now for a fact that they were exremely doubtful about being allowed to ee Butler. For my own part) I did not magine for a moment that) the Sydney )olice officers in charge of the aconsed nan would allow them to entor lis coll and chat with him. But t is the unexpected that most often hapions. The steamer had hardly got alongside he wharf before tho ncoueed man's cell was ull of reporters with pencil and notebook n hand, while others blocked the narrow ;angway awaiting their turn, which to all vho could poseess their souls in patienci iame at last. These gentlemen could carcely beliove their good luck. They had in tieipated all manner of difficulties. But iere they were tete-a-tete with Butler withiut a single objection being raised, askng him with the greatest nonchalance or direct evidence to hang him, ai ie was cute enough to remind them, [uestioning him about his attempted ulcldo (which he eeemetl more loth ;o talk about than the Mountain nurders), and working up "a good senlational interviow." And after the nterviewers came tho photographers. Sutler gave them a less cordial weepion. "Here , * a man wants to photojraph you," said Detective Roche, "what io you say?" "Toll him to go to —" vae Butler's laconic and emphatic reply, ie had an objection to facing the camera. Perhaps he suspected that it, too, might be )btaining direct evidence against him. 3ut to one photographer at least he ionsented to give a " eitting," at) the equest of a Hmu> representative, ind although the light was bad in excellent photograph wai obtained, vhich was reproduced in yesterday's iERALD. Butler w«« allowed to be revarded by the Herald representative with i glasß of whisky. It> was obtained in a rlass and poured into a tin pannikin by one if the deteotives. ''Have a whiiky, Jutler?" he asked, after duly watering it. ' Well, I don't mind if I do," answered the irisoner, and swigged it off with evident jUjtO. And so all day callers came and went. Che prisoner's cell was rarely free of rieitore. At times it was uncomfortably •rowded and the hilarity boisterous, ihouta of laughter came from it at inervals. Somebody was evidently telling a unny story. It inußt have been " excruliatine," for those in the cell literally oared" with, laughter as if they had Ken listening to the choice bits n a screaming burlesque. There was i woman inside, and her laugh wai he loudest of all. One could scarcely jelieve the scene was real—thii man a& msedof many foul murders, chained by Mβ eg to a ring in tho floor like a wild'tout n a menngeris, .lolling on a low bunk Iressed in pyjamas, smoking cigars and lipping whisky, talking and laughiug

with all sorts of persons, joking about his alleged crimes, being plied with all kinds of questions —it was eo unlike everything one expected to find, and bo foreign to the strictness and sternness of British method? of treating those in

custody, even when they have not been convioted of any offence. This American fashion of treating Butler seems to have prevailed all the way from San Francisco, for we read of concerts taking place in hie cell, and passengers visiting him in his quarters without lot or hindrance. This new-fangled notion of prison discipline imported from the United States seems to have occasioned as much surprise in Sydney aa it hat done here, and on hia arrival in New South Wales Batter will find that hia halcyon days of gaol life have come to an end. I do not say that men who are awaiting trial should be treated with as much severity as those who have been convicted. Until a man accused of a crime is found guilty he ia assumed in the eye* of the law to be innocent, and should be treated with greater consideration than the condemned. Bub between allowing a prisoner awaiting trial such comforts as cigars and whisky, and permitting him to be visited by ail and sundry, to hold daily receptions in his cell, and to be treated as a hero, there ia a wide distinction. Id is inconsistent with the decorum, the gravity, and the seriousness which invesb British justice, and which happily have to far prevented prisoner! of the Butler stamp from posing in public and feeding their vanity upon the gaping curiosity of the morbidly-minded.