THE IDAHO SENSATION

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1847, 31 July 1907, Page 31

THE IDAHO SENSATION

THE MURDER OF GOVERJNTOR STEUNEN BERG. NEW YORK, July 29. The trial of Hey woo cl, Moyer, and Pettibone, officials of the Western Miners’ Federation, for complicity in. the murder of Mr Steunenberg, Governor of Idaho, which has been proceeding at Boise for several months, has ended, so far as Heywood is concerned, in a verdict of acquittal. It is understood that the oases against Moyer will be abandoned. The jury deliberated for twenty-one hours. In the first ballot eight of the jurors supported a verdict of acquittal and four favoured a decision involving some degree of murder. The minority were won over during the night. Heywood, on leaving the dock, thanked each juryman. No demonstration was made. LONDON, July 29. The New York correspondent of 'The Times” says:—Doubtless Orchard will be made to pay the penalty of his crimes. Heywood’s exoneration implies exoneration of the entire inner circle of the Western Miners’ Federation. The verdiot is a complete surprise, equally to the public as to newspaper correspondents at Denver, who declare that disagreement on the part of the jury was the utmost Hey wood’s friends expected. The Idaho sensation has been so prominently before the public that the general features of the case are familiar to moat people. Briefly, a fiend named Harry Orchard states that among many murders and other primes committed by him was the assassination of the Governor of Idaho. Mr Steunenberg. He asserts that he was employed to commit this murder by Heywood, Moyer and Pettibone, representing the inner oircle of the Western Miners' Federation. On the other hand, the accused men declare that the charge against them ?vaa worked up by the mine-owners. The case has aroused profound interest, and the town in which the trial was taken had to be strongly reinforced with police.