SENTENCE UPHELD

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22741, 29 November 1935, Page 18

SENTENCE UPHELD

LINDBERGH BABY CASE HAUPTMANN INFORMED WIFE TO CONTINUE APPEAL. Bruno Richard Hauptmann, convicted kidnapper and murderer of Charles A. Lindbergh, jun., learned on October 9 in the death house of Trenton Prison that his main hone for life had gone (states the New York Times). Even his iron nerve was shaken. He moaned when one of his lawyers told him, on the eve of his tenth wedding anniversary, that the Court of Errors and Appeals, New Jersey's highest, tribunal, had affirmed the verdict of guilty returned against him on February 13 at Flemington by a jury of eight men and four women. In strong and unequivocal language, the High Court held that, in the light of the evidence, which though circumstantial "pointed to guilt from so many directions," no room for reasonable doubt was left, and no verdict other than the one found by the Flemington jury would have been justified. , . ~ The decision was a crushing blow to Hauptmann. Morose and silent, he sat on the iron couch in his cell and stared at the pictures of his wife and his son, Mannfried, on the walls, after C. Lloyd Fisher, hie chief counsel, left him with the cheering statement that the fight to save him had "just begun. The prisoner's evening meal went untouched. In New York City,* Mrs Hauptmann received the news by telephone. With a despairing sob, she declared she would continue to place her faith in God and fight on for her husband's vindication. Colonel Charles A. Lindbergh, whose infant son Hauptmann was convicted of kidnapping and murdering on March 1, 1932, made no comment on the decision of the court. . Under the court's decision three forlorn hopes remain to Hauptmann. He may take his case to the Supreme Court of the United States, demand a new trial on the ground of newly-dificovered evidence, or throw himself on the mercy of the State Board of Pardons, which has the power to commute his sentence to life imprisonment. Defence counsel announced that their first step would be to seek a review of the case by the United States Supreme Court.