TRIAL OF ARBUCKLE.

Taranaki Daily News, 5 January 1922, Page 5

TRIAL OF ARBUCKLE.

THE CLOSING SCENES. DELIBERATIONS O£ THE JURY. ONE WOMAN STANDS OUT. Further details of the closing scenes in the trial of Roscoe Arbuckle, the film comedian, on a charge of the manslaughter of Miss Virginia Rappe, came to hand by a recent mail. A San Francisco correspondent, writing under date December 4, says: After 40 hours’ deliberation, the Arbuckle jury filed into Judge Harold Louderback’s Court at ten minutes after 12 this afternoon, announced it could not agree upon a verdict, and was discharged. August Fritze, foreman of the panel, announced that “Many, many ballots” had been taken, and that the last ballot showed ten to two. The jurors, questioned after their discharge, declared that had it not been for Mrs. Helen Hubbard, they would have returned in ten minutes with a verdict of not guilty. Mrs. Hubbard voted for conviction on every -ballot, they declare. Nothing they could say or do would sway her. She would listen to no argument, would discuss no part cf the evidence. “She simply said she would vote ‘guilty’ for ever,” said one of the jurors. Thomas Kilkenny also voted for conviction on numerous ballots, but it is said he voted so in the hope of gaining Mrs. Hubbard’s confidence and then bringing her over to the other side. The disagreement was a blow to Arbuckle and to his wife, his mother-ia-law, and other relatives, who have been present all through the trial. But it was expected. It came with no thrills whatsoever. » The foreman of the jury made the announcement, and each juror was questioned by the Judge. Each gave it as his opinion that it was “morally and physically impossible for them to reach an agreement.” The Judge thafiked them and discliarged them. Arbuckle rolled a brown paper cigarette, waited, until the Judge had said that it would be impossible to try him again before January 9, and the oppose tion had agreed to the date, then lit hiar cigarette and got up. “MY CONSCIENCE IS CLEAR.’? Deputy District Attorney Milton Uh-s reh walked over to Attorney Gavin MoNab, Arbuckle’s chief counsel, and fields out his hand. “I just want to congratulate your,, client on his gameness,” he said. Af* buckle, who was standing beside his counsel, < said: — “I’m game because my conscience id clear, much clearer than yours, Mr. ÜBm ren.” e Out in the corridor Brennan was near,, to tears. He talked, too, about the tactics of the opposition, for the benefit of Air. Uhren’s ears. Friends rushed him down the corridor before he had said too much. Outside the hall of justice, Mrs. Ar* buckle dtood with her mother, Mm. Flora Durfee, and with some other friends. “The poor boy,” she said. “He’ll have to go through it all again.” Arbuckle, in the office of his attorneys, made the following statement: “While this is not a legal acquittal, through a technicality, I feel it is a moral one. But for one woman on the jury of 13, who refused to allow her fellow-jurors to discuss the evidence or, to reason with her, and who would give no explanation for her attitude, my trial would have resulted in an immediate acquittal.” By the “jury of 13” Arbuckle meant that 12 out of 13 had been for him. The 13th juror, who heard all the evidence, but was not, allowed to vote, declared that he would have acquitted Arbuckle if he could. “After the organised propaganda designed to make the securing of an impartial jury an impossibility and to prevent my obtaining a fair trial,” the statement concludes, “I feel grateful for this message from the jury.”

EARLIER DECISION ANTICIPATED.

That an earlier decision by the jury was anticipated is shown by the fact that after it had been out only a JittH over four hours the Court was crowded with those anxious to ascertain the result of this remarkable trial. ]t was reported at 11 o’clock on the iirst evening that the jury had taken its seventh. l>allot, that one woman was standing out for conviction, and Deputy Sheriff Harry McGovern announced that the jurors would be taken to their hotel.

It was a great disappointment to the* crowd of hundreds of men and •who packed the Court room and the corridor outside. It was a blow to the defendant, and to his wife, Mints Dur* fee Arbuckle.

All that afternoon, from the time tha jury filed out until it went to lun?iv at 6 o’clock, Mrs. Durfee sat motionless, waiting, one hand held to her forehead, the other held in that of a friend. Her hfead was bent, her eyes wer® closed.

When the jury came back, after eight o’clock, Mrs. Arbuckle was better. She laughed and chatted ‘with friends, and told stories of “Fatty,’* watching him as he talked with various knots of people. “Fatty” was confident during the early hours of the vigil, that the jury would come filing in presently, bearing a verdict of acquittal. He talked and laughed, smoked brown paper of his own rolling, sat in the jury box, sat in the witness chair, sat in the .Judge’s chair, asserted over and owt again that he wasn’t getting “any kioks out of this, that all thrills were ex< hausted after he had told his story. But as the night wore on and the jury continued to stay in the jury room, thu comedian grew sombre, ceased to laugh, ceased to talk much, smoked incessantly, went out often, squeezing his great girth through the dense crowds in the doorway.