267 Sheet – American State Trials 1918 Volume X Leo Frank Document

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Reading Time: 4 minutes [604 words]

Here is the translated text as follows:

LEO M. FRANK

I was introduced to the third degree of the Atlanta police department by detectives Scott and Black, who began questioning Newt Lee. The way Detective Black treated that poor old negro, Newt Lee, was something awful. He shrieked at him, hollered at him, cursed him, and did everything but beat him. Then they took Newt Lee down to a cell, and I went to my cot in the outer room.

Before closing my statement, I wish to touch upon a couple of insinuations and accusations, other than the one on the bill of indictment, that have been leveled against me so far during the trial. The first is the fact that I would not talk to the detectives and that I would not see Jim Conley.

On Sunday morning, I went to headquarters twice, willingly, without anybody coming for me. I answered frankly and unreservedly, giving them the benefit of the best of my knowledge. On Monday, they came for me; I went down and answered any and all of their questions and gave them a statement which they took down in writing. On Tuesday, I was at the police station again and answered every question, talked to anybody who wanted to talk with me about it, and I have even talked with them at midnight when I was just about to go to bed. I spoke to Newt Lee alone, but what was the result? They commenced and grilled that poor negro and put words into his mouth that I never said, and twisted not only the English but distorted my meaning. I decided then and there that if that was the line of conduct they were going to pursue, I would wash my hands of them.

On May 1st, I was taken to the Fulton County Tower. On May 3rd, detectives Black and Scott came up to my cell and wanted to speak to me alone without any of my friends around. Black said, "Mr. Frank, we are suspicious of that man Darley. We are watching him; we have been shadowing him. Now open up and tell us what you know about him." I said, "Gentlemen, you have come to the wrong man, because Mr. Darley is the soul of honor and as true as steel. He would not do a crime like that; he couldn’t do it." And Black said, "Come on, Scott, nothing doing," and off they went. That showed me how much reliance could be placed in either the city detective or our own Pinkerton detectives, and it was for this reason that I didn’t see Conley, surrounded with a bevy of city detectives and Mr. Scott, because I knew that there would not be an action so trifling, that there was not an action so natural but that they would distort and twist it to be used against me, and that there was not a word that I could utter that they would not deform and twist and distort to be used against me. But I told them through Mr. Klein that if they got the permission of Mr. Rosser to come, I would speak to them, would speak to Conley and face him or anything they wanted—if they got that permission or brought Mr. Rosser. Now, that is the reason that I have kept my silence, not because I didn’t want to, but because I didn’t want to have things twisted.

Then there is that other implication, the one of knowing that Conley could write and didn’t tell the authorities.

On May 1st, I was taken to the tower. On the same date, the