Here's Where It Gets Interesting - The Vigilantes, Episode 3

Episode Date: April 1, 2024

It’s been 48 hours since Mary Phagan was last seen alive. It’s a media frenzy, and police are feeling the pressure to find the killer.  There’s a new, sudden interest in the murder notes. Did the killer write them to throw off investigators?  By the end of this episode, three men would become suspects. And despite dubious evidence and changing stories, one would soon be indicted for Mary’s murder. With a mob looking for vengeance, and sensational newspaper coverage, chances of a fair trial in Atlanta, Georgia were slim. The trial would begin July 28th, 1913, but this story is far from over. Join us for part three of this seven-episode series, The Vigilantes. Host/ Executive Producer: Sharon McMahon Supervising Producer: Melanie Buck Parks Audio Producer: Jenny Snyder  Writers: Amy Watkin, Sharon McMahon Researched by: Kari Anton, Sharon McMahon, Amy Watkin, Mandy Reid, Melanie Buck Parks  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As a Fizz member, you can look forward to free data, big savings on plans, and having your unused data roll over to the following month. Every month. At Fizz, you always get more for your money. Terms and conditions for our different programs and policies apply. Details at fizz.ca. This episode is brought to you by Dyson OnTrack. Dyson OnTrack headphones offer best-in-class noise cancellation and an enhanced sound range range making them perfect for enjoying music and podcasts get up to 55 hours of listening with active noise cancelling enabled soft microfiber

cushions engineered for comfort and a range of colors and finishes dyson on track headphones remastered buy from dyson canada.ca with anc on performance may vary based on environmental conditions and usage accessories Accessories sold separately. Here's where it gets interesting is now available ad-free. Head to SharonMcMahon.com slash ad-free to subscribe today. It's been 48 hours since Mary Fagan was last seen alive. Pencil factory night watchman Newt Lee is being held for questioning, and police are still collecting evidence. Some accounts say the factory was closed that Monday to accommodate the sensitivities of the women who worked there.

Maybe they were worried women would come to work and faint at the mention of murder, or perhaps women had expressed concern that they would be the killer's next victims. The pencil factory had suddenly become a very dangerous place to work. Whether or not the factory was closed, at least one person showed up. On Monday morning, a factory worker went searching for blood on the second floor after hearing a rumor that Barry had been killed in the metal department where she worked. Right by Leo Frank's office. I'm Sharon McMahon, and here's where it gets interesting.

As employees returned to the factory, it seemed like some thought they needed to help investigate the crime. The worker looking for blood believed they found some. There was one small spot on the floor, and upon examining it, the worker said, That was the only spot I could find. I could tell it was blood by looking at it. I can tell the difference between blood and other substances. I found the hair afterwards, about six or eight strands of hair, and pretty long. Another employee declared to police, quote,

It's Mary's hair. I know it. The six or eight strands of auburn hair were twisted around one of the lathes, a tool used to turn and cut wood into the shape of a pencil. It would have been dangerous to have long hair around lathes and knurling machines, so on a normal workday, Mary and her friends wore their hair up, usually covered with a scarf. But remember, Mary was still a young girl, not ready to wear her hair piled on her head every day like a grown woman, and on that special holiday Saturday, she'd been wearing most of her hair down. But without modern DNA testing, how could they be sure this was Mary's hair? Police did think the hairs were important enough for examination, so they collected them and then tested the blood by watching to see if it dissolved in alcohol, an outdated practice even in 1913. The substance

did not dissolve in the alcohol, so they determined that it had to be blood. It's possible that they used up or degraded the blood sample with this ineffective experiment. Whether they did or not, no one ever did any further testing. So at this point, they didn't know whose hair they'd collected or whose blood if, in fact, it was blood that they'd found. Had Mary been killed up on the factory floor next to Leo's office and then dragged to the basement on the elevator? The Atlanta newspapers went wild with coverage over the holiday weekend, complete with what they claimed were photos of Mary's body lying in the morgue. These photos actually showed Mary's head on someone else's body. Someone had cut around areas of one photo with a very sharp blade

and used that as a stencil for a second photo so they could tape them together and photograph them as one new image. Like very, very rudimentary Photoshop. A photo of the clothing Mary was wearing on the day of her murder was published in the Atlanta Georgian. It's eerie to see her stained, torn dress lying on a table next to her hat, shoes, hair bows, parasol, and most disturbing of all, the rope found around her neck. Newspapers offered rewards for information leading to arrests, but this garnered more false claims than anything else. Teen factory workers were excited by the attention they got from reporters and happily shared their thoughts. The Atlanta Georgian reported, But police also contributed to the problem, sharing theories with reporters as if they were

facts. Leo's priority was getting the factory running again as soon as possible. If the factory wasn't operating, no one was making money, including the factory workers, who, like Mary, needed every penny to help support their families. But Leo kept getting dragged back to the police station. Leo's lawyer was outraged, saying, Why, it's preposterous! A man who would have done such a deed must be full of scratches and marks, and his clothing must be bloody. To further prove his point,

Leo took off his clothes in front of the officers, later saying, I showed them my underclothing and my top shirt and my body. I bared it to them all. I had everything open to them and all they had to do was look and see it. Police didn't find a bruise, a scratch, or even a spot of blood on Leo. They went through Leo's laundry. No blood, no torn clothes, nothing dirty from a struggle in the factory basement. Once again, officers sent Leo back home. Newt Lee, however, didn't seem to be going home anytime soon.

Police were confused about Newt's time slip, and I know you're probably picturing a piece of paper that you put into a time clock and punch at the beginning and end of a shift, but what Newt used was more commonly called a watch clock, standard equipment for a watchman or security guards at the time. It was kind of like an old round alarm clock locked into a case about the size of a canteen with a strap that the guard wore over his shoulder while walking around the building. And while he was walking around, he passed strategically placed key stations throughout the factory. At each key station, there was a small metal box with a key chained to it, and the guard would insert that key into the clock he was carrying, which would

punch a little piece of paper inside the clock. The guard could not open the case around the clock to access the paper or the time slip and make any changes, but the supervisor could unlock the watch clock and check the time slip after every shift. Each punch looked a little different, so if the guard had visited each key station at the appropriate times, the paper would be punched in the correct places. Newt's time slip should have been punched every 30 minutes as he did rounds, but many punches were reportedly missing. At first, police said that between 9.30 p.m. and 3 o'clock a.m., Newt did not punch every half hour, and most notably, didn't punch in at all between 2 and 3 a.m. And yet yet even this little piece of paper that should objectively show clear information,

either the slip was punched or it wasn't punched, became a source of debate. Newt later reported, Mr. Frank opened the clock and said the punches were all right, that I hadn't missed any punches. And no one refuted those statements. punches. And no one refuted those statements. Regardless of any time slip discrepancies, Newt claimed he had only found Mary's body. He hadn't seen anything before that. Police searched Newt's home, and in the metal trash barrel he used as a dresser, they found a man's shirt covered in dried blood. Newt argued that he had not worn or even seen that shirt in two years. The shirt didn't smell worn, and the bloodstains on it were in strange places, as if

the shirt had been used to mop up blood. They didn't look like stains you'd get from wearing a shirt while murdering someone. If this were an episode of Law & Order, you'd hear someone say, test this for DNA. And in fact, human DNA had just been discovered in the early 20th century, but it would be almost 100 years, 1986, before DNA was first used as evidence in a court of law. Suffice it to say, the Atlanta Police Department didn't have the knowledge or the tools for DNA testing in 1913. Police were still desperate for information. Newt was chained to a chair with no lawyer present, and some reports say he was beaten and tortured mercilessly. was beaten and tortured mercilessly. Police called this technique the third degree, and after three days of this, their methods left Newt Lee weeping and nerveless. When he didn't give them the answers

they wanted, they threw him in a cell and left him there. Police went to Newt, holding up a copy of the Atlanta Georgian with a headline proclaiming Lee's guilt proved. Still, Newt's story didn't change. That's when a salesman named Francis Wright came to the police station, claiming he had a gift for getting Black people to talk to him. Wright had no connection to the case, and we can assume no evidence of his quote-unquote talents, but police let him into Newt's jail cell, telling Newt he was a minister. Wright tried to convince Newt to confess, saying, quote, Newt, you haven't got long on this earth. Only a few days. They're going to get you. They've already got you. What little time you've been allotted for life,

you better put to good advantage. They were presumably the white mobs who had proven during the Atlanta race massacre that they would lynch a black man for much less than the murder of a white girl. Would this stranger get Newt Lee to finally crack? Not fast enough for the police, who then, if you can believe it, brought in a man to fire a gun in the cell next to Newt's, hoping to scare him into a confession. The gunshot definitely scared Newt and might have even damaged his hearing, yet he still claimed he only found Mary's body and hadn't seen anything before that. Newspapers, clearly less concerned about pesky facts or confessions, were selling editions broadcasting Newt's guilt.

The Tuesday morning edition of the Atlanta Journal shouted from its front page headline, three handwriting experts say Negro wrote the two notes found by body of girl. The newspapers, not the police, had engaged bank officials, not handwriting experts, to study the notes. And this was the conclusion these bank officials had reached. Presumably, the journalist who took the murder notes had delivered them back to the police station, but we know the police were still ignoring the notes, and certainly no actual handwriting experts had looked at them. The paper said, through its own investigations, the Atlanta Journal has proven conclusively that Newt Lee, the Negro night watchman for the National Pencil Company, either himself mistreated

and murdered pretty Mary Fagan, or he knows who committed the crime and is assisting the perpetrator to conceal his identity. Locked in this Negro's breast is the key to the murder mystery that has shocked the entire South. Police wanted a quick resolution to this case, and in the Jim Crow South, it would have been easy to throw away the key to Newt's jail cell and wash their hands of the whole mess. The newspapers had basically already convicted him, and none of them seemed concerned with whether or not they were reporting facts. But in a move that surprised a lot of people, Lise went back to the pencil factory at noon on Tuesday, April 29th,

and did something that suggested they weren't convinced of Newt's guilt. They arrested Leo Frank for the murder of Mary Fagan. Lise claimed they had three reasons to arrest Leo. First, one officer had decided it was Leo who planted the bloody shirt in Newt Lee's home. No fingerprints, no sightings of Leo in Newt's neighborhood, no strange gaps in Leo's reported weekend activities, just one officer's hunch. Second, police claimed that the blood on the second floor of the factory condemned Leo. Other than that unscientific test to see if it was actually blood, no other testing on the stain had been done, but it was near Leo's

office. The third bit of evidence the police used to arrest Leo was his nervous behavior when talking to the police, especially when they picked him up the morning of Mary's murder and refused to tell him why they were there. Even the fact that Leo had called a lawyer made police suspicious. Today, anyone arrested or even detained by the police has the right to an attorney, but in 1913, it raised questions. Why would Leo need an attorney if he was innocent as claimed? Even the newspaper reporters who'd been playing fast and loose with the facts asked how any of this could possibly be enough evidence to arrest Leo. The chief of police said only,

the town seems to be very much wrought up over the murder, and I think this is the wisest course to take. They couldn't risk another Atlanta race massacre. Making an arrest was a good way to calm the city down. But why Leo? Remember what journalist Harold Ross had written in the Atlanta Journal? what journalist Harold Ross had written in the Atlanta Journal? The murder of Mary Fagan must be paid for with blood, and a Negro's blood would not suffice. Atlanta newspapers had already framed Mary's murder as Southern womanhood defiled by Northern industrialization, a pretty innocent white child had suffered an unthinkable murder

in the place where she worked. What better suspect than Leo? He was a factory supervisor and an educated, relatively wealthy Northerner. And let's not forget, he was also Jewish. And the last person known to have seen Mary alive. and the last person known to have seen Mary alive. Despite Leo's status in Atlantic society, the seeds of anti-Semitism that laid buried underground begin to grow, pushing their way to the surface. Anti-Semitism wasn't new, nor was it exclusive to Atlanta,

the South, or even America. Historian Leonard Dinerstein writes, Historically in America, distrust of Jews dates to the days of slavery. Hostility towards Jews emanating from Christian teachings in the early 19th century carried over into the 20th. When they brought Leo to the station, Atlanta police were hoping Newt Lee and Leo Frank could either form an alliance to implicate them both or be pitted against each other so at least one of them would admit what they had done. Police put Newt and Leo in a room together,

hoping for a confession. The conversation lasted only about 10 minutes, and Leo's account was calm, making him seem more like the interrogator than a fellow prisoner. Leo reported, they put Newt Lee into a room and handcuffed him to a chair. By the way, no reports that they handcuffed Leo to the chair. I said, now, Newt you are here and I am here and you had better open up and tell all you know and tell the truth, the full truth, because you will get us both into lots of trouble if you don't tell all you know. And he answered me like an old Negro. Before God, Mr. Frank, I'm telling you the truth and I have told you all I know. And the conversation ended right there. But the police remembered it differently. One officer claimed to have listened in on the

conversation and heard Leo say to Newt that they would both go to hell if Newt didn't talk. When officers entered the room after the 10-minute conversation, one of them claimed Mr. Frank was extremely nervous at that time. He was very squirmy in his chair, crossing one leg after the other, and he didn't know where to put his hands. He was moving them up and down his face, and he hung his head a great deal of the time the Negro was talking. Once again, Leo's fidgeting and obvious discomfort implicated him. Newt and Leo were both returned to their jail cells.

At this point, Leo had no faith in the police, saying, I knew there was not a word that I could utter that they would not deform and distort and use against me. Things were looking dire for Leo, and his wife, Lucille, knew it. She went to the police station with her father and brother-in-law, and Leo received a message that she was downstairs weeping bitterly. To protect her from seeing him in a jail cell, Leo sent her a note suggesting he would be released soon and she should go home. She did, but later described her time in the police station saying, I was humiliated and distressed by numerous people, maybe newspaper reporters, maybe somebody else snapshotting me with hand cameras. I was besieged for interviews and made thoroughly miserable in many ways. in many ways. The circus around Leo Frank had begun, and yet he still wasn't the only suspect.

On Thursday, May 1st, another Black man was arrested on suspicion of Mary Fagan's murder. Jim Conley was 27 years old and often drunk, but he was able to maintain employment doing odd jobs and sweeping at the pencil factory. Conley had a police record resulting in two sentences to chain gangs. He lived with a woman he had never married, a strike against him at that time. In general, Conley was considered a troublemaker. Police questioned Conley because he was seen at the factory on the day of Mary's murder rinsing reddish stains out of a shirt. Conley claimed the stains were made by rust and he had been drunk all day on Saturday, April 26th, and nowhere near the factory. Police never tested the shirt. Conley firmly stated that he could not read or write, so it stood to reason that he could not have written the murder notes.

But detectives learned that a black man had been seen in the factory's lobby on Saturday afternoon. The wife of a factory employee said she saw a black man she couldn't identify near the elevator shaft at about noon on April 26th, the exact same time Mary had been there collecting her pay. Elise also found several papers with Conley's signature on them, showing that he probably could read and write. Now, finally, Elise started paying attention to those murder notes. Elise dictated some phrases from the murder notes to Conley and had him write them down. A cursory glance showed that Conley's handwriting was very similar to the handwriting on the murder notes, and Conley had made the same spelling mistakes, writing Night Watch as W-I-T-C-H, for example. Conley had been caught in a blatant lie,

had been caught in a blatant lie, and it wasn't the last time he would change his story. That same day, less than a week after her funeral, Mary's body was exhumed and an autopsy performed right there in the cemetery in order to determine the time of death. The press didn't learn of the autopsy being performed until Mary's body had been reburied, so no photographs were taken. Just two days after the outdoor autopsy, Mary's body was once again dug up and laid on a blanket next to the gravesite. This time, coroners would cut off pieces of her hair because, and I know this will shock you after all of the examples of really great police work, police had lost the hair samples previously collected. They also took photographs of the bite mark and fingerprints on Mary's body, intending to match the photos with the fingerprints of suspects. to match the photos with the fingerprints of suspects. Prosecuting attorneys also ordered testing of the shirt found at Newtley's house and the spot of blood found on the pencil factory floor. But no one ordered any testing of the shirt Jim Conley was seen washing red stains out of.

Even as officers collected evidence pointing to Conley, lawyers continued moving forward with Leo's case. On May 5th, a grand jury was convened. If the grand jury felt there was enough information to indict Leo, then the criminal trial would begin. A factory worker testified that she hadn't found Leo in his office shortly after 12 o'clock noon on Saturday, April 26th, right after Mary had been there. A madam from an Atlanta brothel claimed Leo was a regular customer who had called her on the 26th, looking for a place to bring a young girl who had taken ill. The prosecution claimed that the murder notes could not have been written by Newt Lee,

but no one examined Leo's handwriting and no one mentioned Jim Conley. I'll say it again. No one mentioned Jim Conley. The grand jury was never told about the shirt Conley was seen washing in the factory, never told about his handwriting and misspelling matching the murder notes, never told that he had lied to the police. Jim Conley's name never came up in front of the grand jury. Yet, apparently, what the jury heard was enough, and on May 23, 1913, Leo Frank was indicted for the murder of Mary Fagan. Newspaper reporters didn't seem to agree with Leo's indictment.

In fact, it was one of the only early stories connected to Mary's murder that didn't make it to the front pages. A story in The Georgian stated, the most the state has done is to establish that he had the opportunity to commit the murder. Leo Frank was never seen with the girl, either on the day of the strangling or before. It's not known that he ever spoke to her except in connection with her work. None of Frank's clothing has been found with bloodstains upon it. No fingerprints upon the girl's body or clothes were identified as his. None of his personal belongings were found near the body. Absolutely nothing was discovered in the search that fastened the crime on him. Police locked Jim Conley in isolation for three weeks and also gave him the third degree, presumably similar to what they did to Newt Lee.

There's no record of what was said or done to Conley during these weeks, but on May 24th, the day after Leo was indicted, Conley changed his story. He admitted that he was at the pencil factory the weekend of Mary's murder and that he could indeed read and write. In fact, he signed an affidavit saying Leo dictated the two murder notes and had told Conley to write them. He claimed Leo had paid him $2.50 and some cigarettes. According to Conley's story, Leo told him he had rich relatives in Brooklyn and then smirked and said, why should I hang? Conley's affidavit appeared in the newspapers

on May 24th and seemed to confirm Leo's guilt on the day after he was indicted by the grand jury. Conley remained in jail and always seemed to be surrounded by lawyers and police going over his story so many times that it was hard to tell who the story even belonged to anymore. And then, surprise, Conley's story changed again. He said he'd claimed to be at the factory on Friday because he was too scared to admit he'd actually been there on Saturday, the day of the murder. The real story, Conley claimed, was that on Saturday, Leo told him to sit outside the factory until Leo whistled for him. And then when Conley went up to Leo's office, Leo was nervous and dictated the notes for him to write. Conley said that Leo had dalliances with women in his office. According to Conley, it was why he had to wait

to come up to his office until Leo whistled. He still claimed he never saw any blood or evidence of a body. Could any of this be true? Police and lawyers had been convinced that Mary's murder was an unplanned crime of passion, but Conley's story showed clear premeditation and also answered questions about the murder notes. But why would Leo have trusted Conley with this knowledge of his intended crime? And why hadn't Conley come forward right away with this supposed evidence of Leo's guilt? The Georgian newspaper questioned Conley's entire story, printing, With his first affidavit repudiated and worthless, it will be practically impossible to get any court to accept a second one.

it will be practically impossible to get any court to accept a second one. The paper also expressed the opinion that the case against Conley was stronger than the case against Leo Frank. But Conley wasn't done yet. After seeing a newspaper headline proclaiming that the factory foreman thought Conley had killed Mary Fagan when he'd been half-drunk, Conley decided to make yet another new statement. In his third affidavit, Conley said, when he whistled for me, I went upstairs and he asked me if I wanted to make some money right quick. And I told him, yes, sir. And he told me that he had picked up a girl back there and had let her fall and that her head hit against something. He didn't know what it

was and for me to move her. And I hollered and told him the girl was dead. And he told me to pick her up and bring her to the elevator. Finally, a match with the police officer's story that Mary was killed on the factory floor near Leo's office, carried downstairs and dragged through the basement. Conley was a bigger man than Leo, but claimed he still couldn't manage the body on his own, so he said Leo helped him get Mary's body to the elevator and into the basement. Conley then said Leo had given him a roll of cash equaling $200, which would be about $6,000 today, and told him to keep quiet. But then Leo took the money back, saying he'd give it to Conley on Monday if nothing went wrong.

Police brought Conley to the factory so he could reenact his activities from April 26th. The day watchman who was there during this reenactment stated that he heard police correct Conley's story several times as if they were rehearsing a play and teaching him his lines. Conley claimed he and Leo had left the body in a particular spot in the basement, but the police quote-unquote reminded him it had actually been found somewhere else. As was becoming the usual in this case, newspapers printed speculation as truth. 30th. They reported Conley's newest version of the story as fact, despite another man coming forward to say he'd been shooting craps with Conley that Saturday, April 26th, when they saw Mary Fagan walk into the factory. This man said Conley told him he was going to try to steal her money from her. The man claimed Conley did run after Mary when she came out of the factory,

but the man left the scene before he saw anything more too afraid of what he might witness. Indeed, things were starting to look bad for Conley. William Randolph Hearst's paper, The Atlanta Georgian, had taken a decidedly pro-Leo stance, positioning the other major Atlanta newspapers as anti-Leo. Nevertheless, a reporter for The Georgian published a story asserting there were 18 facts pointing to Conley as the murderer and only three implicating Leo, all three of which could be dismissed as a coincidence. Leo's attorneys were incensed by Conley's multiple affidavits and clearly rehearsed statements, so they petitioned to have a grand jury hear a case to indict Conley.

Prosecuting attorneys, of course, argued against indicting Conley, but Leo's lawyers called for a letter-writing campaign, and sure enough, letters flooded in imploring the grand jury to hear the case against Conley. The Atlanta Georgian reported that a, quote, bombardment of letters and petitions from many citizens poured in, so clearly the campaign had worked. On July 21st, just one week before Leo's trial was scheduled to begin, the grand jury heard arguments in the case to indict Jim Conley. As hard as Leo's lawyers worked to make their case,

the grand jury decided not to indict him. Leo's lawyers argued that all of this media frenzy was creating a hostile environment. A lawyer today would be able to make the case for a change of venue. In just three months, hundreds of newspaper stories in Atlanta were devoted to the case. Newspapers painted factory owners and supervisors as men who would take advantage of young women. The worst of the offenders were, of course, always the men from out of town. The repeated headlines claiming the police knew who the killer was or that the newspapers themselves had solved the case, the revolving door of suspects being arrested, and the fact that the governor had to call out a number of militia units

to guard the jail in order to protect the suspects, all showed that chances for a fair trial in Atlanta were slim. But no change in venue was forthcoming. The trial of Leo Frank began on July 28, 1913, in the Atlanta City Hall building. Leo was actually relieved, saying, I am glad the trial is about to begin after this long wait. I have no fear. I am not only innocent of this crime, but I am innocent of any knowledge of it. His mother traveled from Brooklyn to sit with Lucille at Leo's side in the courtroom.

Brooklyn to sit with Lucille at Leo's side in the courtroom. City officials configured a special, bigger-than-usual courtroom for the trial, knowing it would attract an unusually large crowd. The room was usually used for city council meetings. It was bisected down the middle by a row of fluted columns and lit by 12 globe chandeliers. The columns created a church-like walkway with benches like pews on either side of the room. There were so many people packed into the space when court was called to order that the court reporters had to crouch on the narrow lip of wood molding at the foot of the judge's bench. The jury box was crammed into a corner right next to the press table, which was stacked with copy paper. The courtroom and all of the waiting areas were, of course, segregated.

Electric fans called ozonators attempted to keep the room cool. called Ozanators attempted to keep the room cool. The crowd spilled out onto the lawn of City Hall, bringing picnic baskets and listening through the courtroom's open windows. If you're keeping a list of things from this case that would not happen today, here are a few things to add. The names, addresses, and photographs of jury members were published on the front pages of two Atlanta newspapers on the first day of the trial. The Atlanta Constitution also published an extensive list of witnesses.

Open courtroom windows meant that people inside could hear what was happening outside. Historians estimate that if there were 250 people inside the courtroom, there were about cheered and booed through the trial, and called out threats like, quote, hang that Jew or we'll hang you. Even the sheriff couldn't stop the outdoor chaos, and those threats must have sounded awfully scary to the jurors and witnesses whose information had been published in newspapers, not to mention Leo himself. Even newspaper reports noting that Leo and Lucille were among the best-dressed people in the entire courtroom had a sinister air about them. These reports were pointed reminders that

Leo and Lucille were outsiders. How could they afford all of these nice clothes? They must be making money on the backs of hard workers like little Mary Fagan. The trial lasted for four sweltering weeks. The fans and open windows couldn't conquer the heat. Can you imagine how bad it must have smelled in that packed courtroom as people half-heartedly waved their wilting hand fans trying to keep a breeze flowing? Our knowledge of exactly what occurred during Leo's trial is limited by the fact that the entire transcript of the Leo Frank trial, all 3,500 pages of it, went missing sometime between 1957 and the late 1960s.

The best records of the trial that are available now are the newspaper stories, and as we know only too well, you've got to be careful which stories you believe. Thanks to recent historians working on this case, we're able to piece together most of it, and we'll give you the highlights. One of the first witnesses to testify was the Franks cook and housekeeper Manola McKnight. She was asked about an affidavit she had signed, saying Leo had not been home for lunch on Saturday, April 26th, as he claimed. While on the stand, however, she denied her own signed affidavit.

Manola McKnight was illiterate, and she had been pressured to sign a statement she couldn't read. No matter how hard the prosecutor pushed, she insisted Leo had been at the home he shared with his wife and in-laws during lunchtime on April 26th. The first criminal trial to use fingerprints to convict a person had happened only three years before, in 1910 in Chicago. That was a much larger city with more resources, and standards for using bite marks as evidence in court were not established until 1984. Though we know Leo's prosecuting attorney did have Leo's dental x-rays on file. prosecuting attorney did have Leo's dental x-rays on file. You have to wonder, if they had matched up in any way with the bite marks, would they have tried to use them as evidence in court? And remember the basement door with blood on it? The police had not collected any part of it as evidence, but an Atlanta citizen had cut off the bloody pieces of the door and brought them to the police station a few days

after the murder. The police then lost them, found them, and finally had them tested. The chemist said that while the substance on the door was indeed blood, he could not tell whose, and he couldn't even tell if the blood was human. Two doctors gave conflicting testimonies about the blood on Mary's legs. One doctor said Mary was likely raped. The other doctor said there was no evidence of sexual violence, and the blood was probably from Mary's monthly cycle. Leo himself took the stand early in the trial and answered questions for four hours. He walked the jury through his movements on Saturday, April 26th, matching what he'd already said to police officers and detectives. After this testimony,

Leo must have decided he had nothing more to say. He stopped giving interviews or speaking publicly. Reporters dubbed Leo the silent man in the tower because he didn't speak to journalists and was being held in the Fulton County Jail, a facility with a seven-story stone turret. Physical evidence was scarce and inconclusive, so Leo Frank's fate was largely determined by what the jurors believed about his character. Was he the kind of man who could do what he was accused of? Witnesses traipsed through the courtroom, claiming to have seen or heard Leo propositioning the factory girls. They laid suspicion on the way he dressed, the way he talked, and how he was at the factory. Then they started making claims about his interactions with women. During a particularly

taxing day of testimony, when the prosecuting attorney was asking a witness questions like, have you ever heard or witnessed Mr. Frank taking a little girl into the park and sitting her on his lap and playing with her? In a suggestive way, Leo's mother was visibly shaken. She shocked the court by jumping to her feet, pointing to the prosecutor and shouting, no, nor you either, you dog. The prosecutor asked the judge to bar Leo's mother and wife from the courtroom. He said he sympathized with their plight, but needed the court's protection from any more outbursts. In contrast, Mary Fagan's mother screamed in the courtroom on multiple occasions, but at no time was there ever a motion filed to have her expelled.

The judge allowed Leo's family to stay, but then later expelled all women and children from the courtroom because some testimony was, quote, unfit for innocent ears. Newspapers were even banned from printing the details of the aforementioned testimony. Presumably, these were stories about Leo's alleged womanizing and sexual proclivities. But there was also a long list of former Cornell students and faculty members testifying in Leo's defense. Jewish people and Northerners were distrusted by many Southerners, though, so these testimonies may have harmed Leo's cause as much as helped it. Leo's friends and former co-workers testified that he was generally a shy person who did not like being put on the spot. Confrontations of any sort left him frazzled and chain-smoking to calm his

nerves. Those nerves and shyness were often mistaken for snobbery or standoffishness. A fellow member of the Jewish service organization, B'nai B'rith, declared that Leo's greatest work has been among his employees at the factory. The first person to report in the morning and the last to leave at night. Every day in holidays, he has labored to build up a factory that in spirit and efficiency is second to none south of the Mason-Dixon line. Altogether, more than 200 witnesses were called to testify during Leo's trial. No matter how many of those witnesses swore to Leo's upstanding character, the general mood was against him. Hundreds of people waiting outside of the building every day of the trial would jeer at Leo's lawyers as they passed, shouting things at them like,

How much the Jew's paying you? Innocent or guilty, we'll get the damn Jew. Georgia General Assemblymen remembered, there was a thirst for the blood of Mary Fagan's murderer. So intense was this feeling that the very atmosphere in and about the courtroom was charged with these sulfurous fumes of anger. I was in the courthouse several times during the trial, and the spirit, the feeling, the thought of the crowd affected me. Without reason, I found myself prejudiced against Leo Frank. Prejudiced not from facts or testimony,

but by popular belief and hostile feeling manifested by the crowd. With people inside and out clamoring for a conviction or punishment at all costs, it must have seemed unlikely that Leo would survive the trial regardless of the outcome. The state of Georgia's sentence for murder at that time was hanging, and the angry mob wouldn't be satisfied with anything other than death for Leo. But the trial wasn't over yet. There was one person left to testify. In our next episode, Jim Conley takes the stand.

Y'all, we are only halfway through this story and it doesn't end with the trial verdict. I'll see you again soon. I'll see you again soon. researched by Kari Anton, Sharon McMahon, Amy Watkin, Mandy Reed, and Melanie Buck-Parks. If you enjoyed this episode and want to subscribe ad-free, head to SharonMcMahon.com slash ad-free. We'd love for you to leave us a rating or a review, and be sure to hit subscribe so you'll get the next episode as soon as it's available.