The judicial process in the United States of America has become flawed over the years. This has arisen from the fact that most of the American citizens have come out in large numbers condemning the prosecution and injustice to innocent men and women all over the country. As a result, legal scholars have had to engage with the public over issues such as racism, as well as the general degree of anti-Semitism in a bid to reduce the unlawful prosecution of innocent men and women in the United States. In this light, it is important to analyze the Leo Frank case which over the years has become one of the most publicized cases from the State of Georgia. This caused the Jews and other American citizens to protest over the conviction of innocent men since efforts to make appeals sought by the Jews and other constitutional lawyers proved futile. These calls concluded in the upturning of the presented appeals, thereby signifying that the trials were conducted in an atmosphere that was coupled up with public hostility.
The Leo Frank Trial appears to be very significant mainly because it presented important issues taking place during that time when there was a war between races in the United States. This also include oppression of employees by their managers. These among other factors resulted in issues of Southern prejudice against the Jews. There was unequal treatment of the minorities, represented mostly by the blacks and the Jewish communities, especially when it came to the criminal justice system. There was also an anti-Semitism being faced by Frank, in which the jury treated him as one who is a northern capitalist, who used his education and wealth merely to exploit the southerners. Most people believed Frank to be innocent,
In a bid to address the issue, modern literature and studies have had to include the case analysis. As a result, this paper by citing a summary of the case, seeks to show that these cases have become a miscarriage of justice and relating this to the comparable issues happening in the contemporaneous world.
Summary of the case
It was the 27th of April 1913 when a pretty 13-year-old girl named Mary Phagan, was found dead in a pencil factory stated at Atlanta, Georgia. The girl was said to have been beaten, bludgeoned, raped and strangled, by the Jewish owner of the factory named Leo Frank. Frank was the head of B’nai B’rith. One Saturday night, at a time when the factory stood quiet and calm; the town parade for the Confederate Memorial Day had just taken place. Mary, who was an employee, went to the factory to get her monthly paycheck. She worked there putting erasers on the pencils in the factory for a weekly wage of $4.05. Entering the front door, Mary went to the foot of the stairway and up to the second floor, where Frank was busy with the books. She asked for her pay envelope, which Frank handed to her from the safe. Before exiting the door, she turned towards Frank and wished to know whether the metal used for the pencil tips had arrived. Frank objected and in accordance to what was recorded narration, he went on to his work. According to Frank, he heard her footsteps down the stairs outside the door, and later on heard the voice of a female that he was not able to identify. The following morning, Mary’s body was found by watchman Newt Lee, when he went down to the basement of the factory. It was said that; he discovered Phagan’s bloody body, cord wrapped around her neck, her underwear lying loose around her throat, and bite marks on her skin. Her clothes were neatly cut exposing her genitals and one breast, and other bodily signs indicated rape and molestation. The experts concluded that this was the work of a pervert. The State solicitor, Dorsey Hugh, brought about powerful testimonies from a Negro factory sweeper in the company and several employees to point out how ruthless Leo Frank was to his employees.
The law enforcement centered on Frank, and he was tried and convicted, based on witnesses and the testimony of a black man. Later on, Frank was sentenced to death when the governor commuted the sentence in the year 1915. However, as Frank stayed in prison, there were about 25 men who abducted him in Marietta, Georgia, and hanged him from a tree.
After the events in 1915, there was the question on whether the judicial court sentenced an innocent man to death. Since the girl’s body was found on April 27, numerous false reports were submitted to the police officials, in which some wrong statements were given, mainly as a result of religious prejudice. There were hot issues during those days, such as the North vs. the South, black vs. white, Jew vs. Christian, or industrial vs. agrarian. Therefore, the trial attracted huge crowds from the population throughout the Northern states. The Jews believed Frank to be an innocent man who was being denied a new trial. The issue centered on religious prejudice, and there were appeals to the public to aid Frank in his defense, mainly because he was said to be convicted to death mainly because he was a Jew. Solicitations scattered in every part of the North and the South, but most especially around the North. The Southern press even collected a total of $250,000 to “make certain that the guilty Jew, Frank, escaped the gallows”. When Frank was sentenced to death, the Northern press accused the case as a travesty of justice. There were even detectives sent to Atlanta to investigate the case and see if Frank was indeed innocent, or if his trial had been a farce. Comments in the Northern press became bitter, with Georgia being stated as a community of bigots, and its court, branded as cowardly and inept. With this, the Leo Frank Trial was regarded as a consequence of the Northern propaganda brought by bribery, and as Mark Sullivan said, the trial created new flame between the North and the South, and the old animosities between the two structures.
Relies on the case was flawed, and it would be important to understand the case at every stage and account of the details presented in the case. There is a need to use scientific evidence, and the use of witnesses apart from physical appearances and condition found within the case. As Wyatt Thompson mentioned,
we must have a trial by an unbiased and unintimidated court. The statements of witnesses should be carefully weighed, and the truthfulness of each of the witnesses carefully considered in a time of excitement some, forget themselves and prejudge from loose gossip
This may not be too easy since many false reports appeared during the conviction, which should be analyzed and grouped between the true ones and the false. Meanwhile, it is important to lay down the facts, such as the manner in which the place or the building was found during the crime. According to reports, the building was about 200 feet long and four stories high, and it had a deep basement. On the first floor was a long glazed-in office on the right side, and a room enclosure to the left, so that there is a sort of hallway back to the foot of the stairway, leading up to the second floor.
After the Leo Frank Trial, people started to think of the benefits of using science and logistics, as well the importance of thinking logically when judging a criminal offense. Science and logical inference give a clear direction for the investigators and court judges to make wise decisions during the trial. However, as seen in the Leo Frank Trial, false reports, and gossips affected it in a way that confused people as to whether Frank was indeed guilty of the crime being convicted to him. Judgment trials should be guided and carefully weighed by appropriate, rightful, and unbiased statements, and anything that is outside the evidence should be discarded as ineffective statements that should not affect the legal claim.
It would be more interesting, therefore if the paper would focus on the issue of whether or not Frank was innocent of the crime. Some evidence points to the conviction of the Northerners that Frank was indeed innocent. On the other hand, there was also evidence that proves him to be guilty of the crime
Going up the stairway from foot to top is more than 28 feet. One-third of the way up the stairs is a part of the first floor from the stairs, the hatchway, elevator box and passageway used by the pencil factory employees in going into the building from Forsyth Street. The glazed-in office on the right as you go in from the street, the way around the elevator shaft and the hatch hole and all the back of this floor was used by the Clark Woodenware Co. during 1912, and until January 15, 1913.
In addition to the layout of the building, it is also important that the building was vacant the night Mary entered it to get her payout check from Frank, who was on the second floor. The street was quiet and calm since the Confederate Memorial Day had just taken place. There was no one in the building, according to police investigators, except Mary and Frank.
The Frank case was not ally flawed by injustices and the insufficiency of evidence but also symbolized many of the fears of the affected at the time. It is evident that workers have become exploited by their employers as the arms of justice claw many without ‘having to address the question of guilt or innocence. The United States failure to protect citizens has become a salient area of concern for such marginalized groups of American citizens. There has been reported a lot of claims that can be directly connected to the Leo Frank case. This has been inspired by its far-reaching impacts as it struck tremendous fear among Jewish southerners causing monitoring into areas as such which would otherwise affect their dignity.
Bibliography
Dinnerstein, Leonard. The Leo Frank Case. University of Georgia Press, 2008.
Chapman, Daniel J. "Wills-Descent and Distribution-Right of Murderer's Heirs to Inherit from Victim." NDL Rev. 27 (1951): 229.
Gray, Christian. 2016. "The Leo Frank Murder: Semitism Birthing Anti-Semitism". Tribal Theocrat. http://tribaltheocrat.com/2011/04/the-leo-frank-murder-semitism-birthing-anti-semitism/.
Hasian Jr, Marouf. "Judicial rhetoric in a broken world:“Character” and storytelling in the Leo Frank case." Communications Monographs 64, no. 3 (1997): 250-269.
MacLean, Nancy. "The Leo Frank case reconsidered: Gender and sexual politics in the making of reactionary populism." The Journal of American History 78, no. 3 (1991): 917-948.
