THAW IN PRISON.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2339, 4 November 1908, Page 2

THAW IN PRISON.

Public opinion is (says -the New ifork correspondent of the -Daily telegraph”) heartily endorsing some of the outspoken criticism embodied m the report of the New .York State Prisons Commissions referring to the privileges enjoyed by Harry Thaw, who as th© Ticliborne claimant would nave "said, is now “languishing ’ m Poughkeepsie Gaol, it will be remembered that Thaw’s second jury found lie was insane at the time of the Stanford While murder. The judge ordered his removal to Matteawan Criminal Asylum, and there he stayed for some months until his counsel succeeded in having him transferred to elaborate quarters in Poughkeepsie Prison, pending the result of the litigation which>his lawyers were instituting to have him declared no longer a lunatic. . The allusion to the commissioner’s report in tho 'Thaw case is so much to the point- that I quote it- .extensor — “Thaw’s presence in the Poughkeepsie prison,” says the secretary to die commission, “is embarrassing to bho sheriff and objectionable on many accounts. The sheriff had not room for him except in the padded cell. The result is that the sheriff has given- him an entire corridor, with {Thirteen cells adjacent, in the principal gaol for .men. He needs this room for his other prisoners. Thaw consumes a large amount of the time of tlie gaoler in escorting him to Fishkill Landing, White Plains, and other places to -attend the hearing before the Court referees. There is a good deal of public talk that some of these hearings, are on ‘fake’ suits instituted by friends to give him -these outings. '‘His presence here demoralises tho discipline of the institution. He sleeps in the' corridor, not in a cell. He has all the paraphernalia of a business office. He orders his food from a hotel, and it is brought to him three times a day. Silly people send him bouquets of flowers. He is allowed the use of the whole corridor, constituting one quarter of the entire principal gaol for men, while the other prisoners are crowded two in a cell frequently. “All these things are under the observation of the other prisoners, and create a belief that men with money constitute a separate class in the prison.” Meanwhile, Mrs. Harry Thaw is resting in a private hospital. Her husband announces that, although they have agreed upon a separation, he will supply her with financial assistance, whenever she needs it, so long as she employs no. lawyer to collect it.