0167 Sheet – Supreme Court Georgia Appeals of Leo Frank, 1913, 1914

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The Court admitted these samples of partly digested cabbage
taken from the stomach of others, as aforesaid, and in doing so,
committed error for the reasons above stated, and for the furth
er reason that there was no evidence, as the defendant's counsel
contend, that the same circumstances and conditions surrounded
these other parties in the eating and digestion of the cabbage
as surrounded Mary Phagan in the eating and digestion on her
part and no evidence that the stomachs of these other parties
were in the same condition as was Mary Phagan's.

26. Because the Court, in permitting the witness, Harry Scott
to testify over the objection of defendant, made at the time the
testimony was offered, that same was irrelevant, immaterial
and not binding upon the defendant, that he did not get any
information from any one connected with the National Pencil
Company that the negro Conley could write, but that he got his
information as to that from entirely outside sources, and wholly
disconnected with the National Pencil Co.

The court permitted this testimony to be given over the objec-
tions above stated, and in doing so, for the reasons therein
stated, committed error.

This was prejudicial to the defendant, because the negro Con-
ley at first denied his ability to write, and the discovery that
he could write was as the State contended, the first step
towards connecting Conley with the crime, and the solicitor
contended in his argument to the jury that the fact that the
Pencil Company authorities knew Conley could write and did not
disclose that to the State authorities, was a circumstance going
to show the guilt of Frank.

27. Because the Court permitted the witness, Harry Scott, to
testify over the objection of defendant's counsel, made when the
testimony was offered, that the same was irrelevant, immaterial,
illegal and not binding on the defendant, that the witness first
communicated Mrs. White's statement about seeing a negro on the
floor of the pencil factory on April 26th to Chief Lanford, and Bass Rosser, that the information was
given to the detectives on April 28th.

The Court, over the defendant's objections, permitted the above
testimony to be given, and in doing so erred for the reasons