The Girl from Farriss | Page 9

well he didn't know what he was talking about."
"I understand," said another juror, "that we will get our chance at the
vice problem to-day 'through the regular channel'--the Abe Farris case
is on the docket for this afternoon."
"And what will we do?" asked the young man. "We'll listen to answers
to such questions as the assistant State attorney sees fit to ask, and if we
start asking embarrassing questions he'll have the sergeant-at-arms
hustle the witness out of the jury-room. Then we'll hem and haw, and
end up by doing whatever the assistant State attorney wants us to do.
We've done it on every important case--you watch."
"You are quite fight, sir," spoke up a retired capitalist. "In theory the
grand jury system is the bulwark of our liberty--it was, in fact, when it
was instituted in the twelfth or thirteenth century, at a time when there
were several hundred crimes punishable by death; but now that there
are only two, murder and treason, it is a useless and wasteful relic of a
dead past.
"The court that is competent to hold men to the grand jury is much
more competent to indict them than is the grand jury itself. In fact, in
cases where the punishment is less than death the court that now
entertains the preliminary hearing might, to much better advantage to
both the accused and public, pass sentence at once. It hears both sides,
but all that it can do is discharge the prisoner or hold him for the grand
jury. After this there is the expense of holding the prisoner in jail until
his case comes to us, and then all the expensive paraphernalia of a
grand jury is required to thresh over only one side of what has already

been thoroughly heard before a trained and competent jurist. If we vote
a true bill a third expensive trial is necessitated."
"Personally," said Ogden Secor, the foreman of the jury, "the whole
thing strikes me as a farce. The grand jury, while not quite the tool of
the State attorney's office, is considered by them a more or less
harmless impediment to the transaction of the business of their office--a
burden to be borne, but lightened in the most expeditious manner.
"I, as foreman, am a dummy; the secretary is a dummy; the
sergeant-at-arms is a dummy. We look to the assistant State attorney
for direction in our every move. We come from businesses in which we
have never, in all probability, come in contact with criminal law, and
we are expected to grasp the machinery of our new duties on a
moment's notice.
"Were it purely a matter of justice to be dispensed, I have no doubt but
that we might do quite as well as any court; but we are up against a
very different thing from justice--at every hand we are trammeled by
law."
The assistant State attorney entered the room.
"Sorry to have been late, gentlemen," he said. "Call the next case, Mr.
Sergeant-at-arms,'' and the routine of the jury-room commenced half an
hour after the appointed time, although a quorum of the grand jury had
been present for thirty-five minutes.
The last case of the afternoon call was that against Abe Farris. There
were only two witnesses--Officer Doarty and the girl, Maggie Lynch.
Doarty had suffered a remarkable change of heart since the evening he
stood in the alley back of Farris's. He was chastened in spirit. His
recollection of the affair was vague. After the assistant State attorney
had ceased questioning him several of the jurors asked additional
information.
"What sort of person is the complaining witness, officer?" asked the
banker.

Mr. Doarty looked about and grinned sheepishly. He would not have
been at a loss for a word to describe her had a fellow policeman asked
him this question, but this august body of dignified business men
seemed to call for a special brand of denatured diction in the
description of a spade.
"Oh," he said finally, "she's just like the rest of 'em down there--she's
on the town."
"Would you believe her story?" asked the banker.
Doarty grinned and shrugged. "Hard to say," he replied.
"In your opinion, officer," asked the assistant State attorney, "have you
any case against Farris? Could we get a conviction?"
"No, I don't think you could," answered the policeman. It was the
question he had been awaiting.
"That's all, officer," said the assistant State attorney. "Just a moment,
Mr. Sergeant-at-arms, before you call another witness."
"A moment, please, officer; I want to ask another question before you
go," spoke up one of the jurymen.
The assistant State attorney sighed and looked bored. He had found this
the most effective means of silencing jurymen.
"As I understand it, you worked this case up,