Sunday, 3rd May 1914: Dorsey Calls C. W. Burke And Other Investigators For Leo Frank To Court, The Atlanta Constitution

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W. J. Burns, on the stand, stated that the "Conley Confession" letters were obtained by Burke, not by himself. He also declared that he had nothing to do with Ragsdale and advised taking the witness away for fear of a "frame-up," asserting that many obstacles were in his path.

Another sensational move was made by Solicitor Dorsey yesterday when he issued subpoenas for C. W. Burke, the private detective for Leo Frank's counsel, and a number of other investigators who have been active in gathering new evidence. Burke will be forced to face a volley of questions from the Solicitor General in explanation of the charges of criminal operations, forgery, and coercion that have been made against him by numerous witnesses in affidavits made public Friday at the retrial hearing.

Process servers went out from Mr. Dorsey's office Saturday morning armed with papers to be served upon Burke, Jimmy Wrenn, George Wrenn, Joe Jacobs, and a number of others. Each will be put upon the rack before Judge Ben Hill Monday morning when the new trial hearing is resumed at the capitol.

Mr. Dorsey has announced that he will seek to find out just what methods were used in securing certain affidavits submitted by the defense, which have since been repudiated by a number of witnesses, some of whom even swear they never made affidavits accredited to them.

Dan S. Lehon, Detective Burns' lieutenant, who has been an active figure in the Burns investigation of the Frank case, will also be put on the stand Monday morning. He will be asked to explain the affidavit of C. W. Ragsdale, the preacher, who made and repudiated a sworn statement to the effect that Jim Conley had confessed, and now declares he was given a bribe of $200 by Burns' agents.

Another man to be examined by Dorsey, and for whom a subpoena has been issued and served, is Carlton C. Tedder, said to be a Burns detective, who was associated with Attorney William M. Smith, Jim Conley's lawyer, and who, it is said, kept his connections with the Burns agency a secret from Mr. Smith. Tedder will be made to explain whether or not he spied upon Smith, and whether or not Smith's movements with Conley and in behalf of the negro were reported to the Burns agency.

Coming after Mr. Dorsey's merciless grilling of Detective Burns Saturday morning before Judge Ben Hill, the prospects of Dorsey's examinations of Burke, Lehon, and the others have created sensational speculation. Mr. Dorsey, it is stated, is anxious to query Detective Burke regarding the affidavit of Marie Karst, the girl business college student and character witness, who swears that she was brought into Burke's operations by a threat to expose publicly a girlhood indiscretion which she committed when she was 15 years old. Her affidavit is a direct accusation of the methods employed by Burke.

He will also be asked to explain other charges that have been made against him, including those of bribery, attempts at bribery, and coercion. Similar charges will have to be answered by Jimmy Wrenn, who is said to have been associated with Burke, and by Wrenn's brother, George Wrenn, who recently served a twelve months' sentence for complicity in the noted Gilsey diamond robbery.

Joe Jacobs, a Decatur Street pawnbroker, who is said to have been connected with the Chicago angle of the new evidence, which involves Aaron Allen, a negro interviewed by Burns, will be asked to explain the transaction and also charges that have been made against the methods that are alleged to have been used on the Chicago negro.

At one time, while he faced the grueling fire of Solicitor Hugh M. Dorsey before Judge Ben Hill Saturday morning, Detective William J. Burns found himself perilously near action against him for contempt of court, when he admitted on the witness stand that he had advised attorneys for Leo M. Frank to take a witness away from the city. In answer to a question, he declared that he had suggested to counsel for Frank that they remove Anna Maud Carter to New Orleans, to prevent complications in her connection with the newly discovered Frank evidence. She is the negress who has made an affidavit to the effect that Conley confessed murdering Mary Phagan.

She is now in New Orleans. When Burns stated that he had advised her removal from Atlanta because of his fear that the police and detectives would get hold of the woman and distort her evidence in the kind of "frame-up" which, he said, had been characteristic of the detectives in the Frank case, Solicitor Dorsey conferred with Assistant Solicitor General E. A. Stephens, who sat beside him at the table. Stephens suggested that contempt proceedings be taken. Dorsey's action delayed the examination for a brief space. He resumed it, however, in a few minutes.

Whether or not he will institute contempt charges against either Burns, or those members of Frank's defense who had a hand in the removal of the Carter woman, he would not state Saturday afternoon.

Burns underwent a fierce grilling before Dorsey. He was on the rack for more than an hour in the courtroom on the fourth floor of the Thrower building, at which Judge Ben H. Hill presided. Burns was represented by Attorney Reuben R. Arnold, counsel for Frank's defense, who injected a brief cross-examination.

Burns stated in answer to the Solicitor's questions that, in his opinion, Frank's defense did not require any further evidence to acquit Frank, than the evidence which is contained in the records of the trial at which the man was convicted. He said that he had made a report on his progress at the end of each day to Frank's attorneys, and that he had already submitted to them his final report of the investigation. He declared that he will at once go to Oklahoma to testify in a government land case, but that he will return within ten days.

In explanation of his attitude toward the Carter woman, whose removal to New Orleans he had advised, he said that it seemed that every witness for the defense had been "bamboozled" by operatives for the prosecution, and that he would rather all witnesses for the defense be removed out of this zone of danger. He said that C. W. Burke, the private detective in the employ of Luther Z. Rosser, had unearthed the evidence produced by Anna Maud Carter, and had obtained the letters which are said to have been sent her by Conley. Burns says that the first he knew of the letters or of the woman's connection to the case was when he was apprised of them in the office of Herbert Haas.

He says that George Wrenn, who recently served a twelve months' sentence in the county jail for complicity in the sensational Gilsey $5,000 diamond robbery, had a hand in the letters, and translated them to Burns. Wrenn's brother, Jimmy Wrenn, it was stated, has also been connected with the investigation of newly-discovered evidence for the defense. Both C. W. Burke and Jimmy Wrenn were the objects of withering attacks Friday afternoon when Solicitor Dorsey submitted a large number of affidavits from girls and women and men who accused both Burke and Wrenn of criminal operations in procuring newly-discovered evidence.

Previously, it has been the general impression that Burns himself had procured the evidence of Anna Maud Carter, and had got the letters from her. Burns' examination was set for Monday morning, when the retrial hearing is resumed before Judge Hill, in the capitol. His desire to go to Oklahoma, however, induced court authorities to hold it yesterday morning. Dan Lehon, Burns' lieutenant, was at court, but he will not be examined until Monday morning.

A surprise was sprung when Dorsey plied the detective with a number of questions regarding Carlton C. Tedder, the private investigator who had been associated with Bill Smith, Jim Conley's counsel, for several months, and who has been intimately acquainted with the movements of Conley's attorney. Burns admitted that Tedder was employed as an operative by the Burns agency, and that he had kept this connection secret from Attorney Smith.

Burns, in answer to a question, explained why, in his recent interview with Attorney Smith, he had asked Smith if he trusted Tedder and put faith in him. He said that he had put the question merely to ascertain if Tedder were fulfilling his duty to the Burns office. Tedder's connections have been severed with the Smith office.

In connection with the evidence with which Burns has had to do, the detective declared that he had not found a pocketbook purported to have been Mary Phagan's, and that he did not possess any such article. He said, also, that he had not given out the interview in which he was quoted as having said that he had cleared up the mystery of the pocketbook.

During the cross-examination by Attorney Arnold, Burns stated that he had never worked on a case in which he had been confronted by so many obstacles that had been purposely thrown into his path. He said that at every turn of his investigation he was faced by someone who attempted to thwart his efforts. He was in the act of stating his reasons for believing Conley guilty of the Mary Phagan horror, when Judge Hill interrupted Mr. Arnold's questions, asserting that Burns was merely stating his opinion, and that the facts of the case had already been laid before a court of justice. A sharp clash ensued, Judge Hill informing the attorney that he had made his ruling and ordering him to cease questions of such nature.

Regarding the affidavit of Rev. C. B. Ragsdale, the preacher who repudiates the story to which he swore that he had overheard Conley confess to the Phagan murder, Burns stated that the first he knew of Ragsdale was when Dan Lehon told him that he had heard of a man in an alley. "When he got to the word 'alley'," Burns stated, "I told him to go no further. I had heard enough of men in an alley, and I wanted no more alley propositions. That was my only connection with this man Ragsdale."

Burns likewise stated that it was extremely difficult for him to promote his investigation on account of intense public sentiment. He was asked by Attorney Arnold if he thought any fair-minded man would ever look at the court records and believe Frank guilty. Burns had answered, "Certainly not," when the attorney was interrupted by Judge Hill.