00:00Conley is removed from Fulton Tower at his own request. Atlanta Constitution, Sunday, June 1,
00:051913. Friends of Leo Frank have tried to intimidate him, Negro Sweeper tells Detective Chief,
00:12as reason for his transfer to the police station. Lanford Rapp Sheriff declaring he is not assisting
00:17the police. He appears to be placing obstacles in our way, asserts Chief, in speaking of attempts
00:23to interview the suspected superintendent. Mangum denies intimidation attempts. Chief of
00:29Detectives Newport-Lanford is authority for the statement that James Conley, the Negro Floor
00:33Sweeper of the National Pencil Factory, who, in his latest affidavit, has admitted his complicity in
00:38the Mary Fagan murder after the killing, but lays the crime at the door of Superintendent Leo M. Frank,
00:44was removed from Fulton County Tower to police barracks for imprisonment at his own request to
00:49put an end to the attempts of the friends of the superintendent to intimidate him. Conley was
00:54carried to the police barracks Saturday afternoon after he had been removed from the tower to the
00:59courthouse, where he was put through two hours of questioning by Solicitor General Hugh M. Dorsey
01:05and his counsel attorney W. M. Smith, wanted to avoid Frank's friends. Chief of Detectives
01:11Lanford declared to a Constitution reporter last night that Conley had asked him to be taken away
01:15from the tower to escape the harassments of the visitors of Leo Frank, declaring that they stopped
01:21at his cell and tried to make him drink liquor, and had tried to intimidate him by making jeering
01:25remarks to him and implying threats. I could shoot you through the bars of your cell right now, and
01:31don't you think you ought to be shot? are some of the statements visitors are quoted as making.
01:36Besides, said Chief of Detectives Lanford, I want to be sure I can have Conley where I can talk to
01:42him
01:42whenever he is needed, of which I would be by no means certain were he allowed to remain in the
01:46tower.
01:46I don't want a repetition of the circumstances under which we have to deal with Superintendent
01:51Frank. Sheriff Mangum allows friends of Frank to visit him by the score, but flatly refuses to
01:56allow men working on the case to see him or talk with him. The sheriff says that Frank does not
02:01want
02:01to see the detectives, and that he will not admit anyone to see Frank without his consent.
02:06Three attempts to see Frank. We have made three attempts to obtain an interview with Frank for
02:11Conley, who says that he is sure he can make Frank admit the truth of his Conley's affidavit but have
02:17been refused upon the same grounds that Frank does not want to see Conley. It seems to me that the
02:22important question is not whether Frank wants to see any of the detectives or Conley, but whether
02:26the men who are making every endeavor to clear up the mystery of this horrible murder should be
02:31hampered in their work by being cut off from the most important man in the whole case.
02:36Contrary to assisting us in this case, which as I understand it is the duty of the sheriff of the
02:41county, it appears to me that Sheriff Mangum has placed obstacles in our way. So far as my knowledge
02:47goes, the extent of the sheriff's investigation has been an interview with Frank, who stated that he
02:53was not guilty, following which statement Sheriff Mangum has been quoted as saying, I do not believe he
02:58is guilty. Sheriff explains his position. Sheriff Mangum stated last night that he does not believe
03:04there was any attempt to intimidate Conley while he was in the tower, or that he was disturbed in
03:09any way by visitors. In regard to not admitting detectives or Conley to the tower to see Frank,
03:14Sheriff Mangum said, the prisoners in the tower will be convicted in the courts and not in the jail.
03:20If Mr. Frank will not give his consent to seeing any persons who may ask admittance,
03:24that person shall not be given an interview with Mr. Frank with my consent. If the judge or anyone else
03:30who has the authority cares to admit interviewers without Frank's consent, it is another matter.
03:35If any blame is placed on my shoulders, they are broad enough to bear it. Conley tells story again.
03:41Once more on Saturday, this time to solicitor Hugh Dorsey and his counsel, W. M. Smith Jim Conley,
03:47the Negro floor sweeper of the National Pencil Factory, who has admitted his complicity in the
03:52murder of Mary Fagan after the crime, but places the actual commission of the crime upon the shoulders of
03:57Leo M. Frank, the incarcerated superintendent of the pencil factory, told the details of how he had
04:04helped conceal the dead girl's body in the basement of the National Pencil Factory, just as he has told
04:10it over and over before. And it is believed that before daybreak this morning, the detectives working
04:15on the case may compel him once more to repeat the horrible tale to them. Since the final affidavit,
04:21which the detectives take as true, Jim Conley, though questioned from every possible angle,
04:26has never wavered in any particular of his story. Story rehearsed again. Early Saturday afternoon,
04:33Conley was taken from the Fulton County Tower by Deputy Newt Garner to the Office of Solicitor General
04:38Hugh M. Dorsey in the courthouse, where the solicitor and Attorney Smith had Conley rehearse
04:44his story to them in detail at the time. After the interview with the solicitor, Conley, contrary to
04:49all expectations, was replaced in jail at the police barracks instead of the tower whence he had been
04:55removed to the courthouse. Conley has been removed from the tower to the police headquarters, where
05:00he will be under the immediate supervision of the city police, in order, it is stated, that he may
05:05not be improperly approached or tampered with in any manner which might destroy his value as a witness.
05:11Many friends visit Frank. Contrary to the advice of the detectives, there have been but few minutes
05:17since Frank's imprisonment in the tower when he has not been surrounded by anywhere from one to a dozen
05:23of his intimate friends, while the detectives themselves have been denied admission by the
05:27county authorities. This they consider as a very dangerous policy, and are trying to find means of
05:33putting a stop to it. The proposition of confronting Frank with Conley, which has been the object of a
05:39two-day's fight of the detectives, has been practically abandoned. Sheriff Wheeler C. Mangum of Fulton
05:45County has refused to allow the two men to be brought together, except by consent of Leo M. Frank and
05:51his
05:51counsel, attorney Luther Rosser, Conley is not only agreeable to the ordeal of facing the man, whom he
05:57has openly charged with the murder of Mary Fagan, but is extremely anxious for the opportunity. If we
06:03stand together and look each other in the eye, Conley is quoted as saying, one of us will go down
06:08and it won't be me. Efforts meet with failure. Two determined efforts on the part of the detectives to
06:14bring the men together have been flatly turned down by Frank, the detectives say, and they now regard
06:19further effort as useless. They believe, however, that these refusals of Frank to see Conley will
06:26have material bearing on the case. Frank is said to base his refusal upon a lack of advice from his
06:31counsel, attorney Rosser. Conley's interview with the solicitor and attorney Smith Saturday afternoon
06:37was characterized by all the firmness and accuracy of every statement he has made since he voluntarily
06:43informed the detectives that he had decided to tell the whole story of the crime as far as he knew
06:48it.
06:48Solicitor Dorsey and attorney Smith went over the Negro's entire affidavit with Conley step by step,
06:54overlooking not even the minutest detail, and got from him the identical story that he told,
07:00before, and nothing more. Solicitor Dorsey would issue no statement further than that the evidence
07:05gained from Conley was in no way different from what he had given before. Easy money offer. Conley told
07:11how he had gone to the factory with Frank on the morning of the murder at Frank's request,
07:15and had waited until one or four o'clock that afternoon, when Frank called him into his office
07:20and asked him if he wanted to make some easy money. He told how Frank had directed him to go
07:25to the rear
07:25of the building and remove the body of a girl whom he, Frank, had picked up and dropped. Conley said
07:32that
07:32when he reached the girl's side she was dead. He recounted the gruesome details of how he and Frank
07:37had struggled with the heavy corpse as they carried it to the elevator, dropping it and picking it up
07:42again. He told of how they carried it to the basement in the elevator, and of how they had
07:47concealed the body and both returned to Frank's office exhausted. Conley's story of Frank's concealing
07:53him in a wardrobe while visitors came to his office, and of the superintendent's gift of several
07:58hundred dollars, and his subsequent refusal to let him keep it, was recounted. Chief of Detectives
08:04Newport-Lanford and Detective John Black, with the Pinkerton man, Harry Scott, who have worked up the
08:09evidence in the case, declared Saturday afternoon that they are ready to take the case to the jury.
08:15They accept the Negro's tale in every detail, and declare that the last link in their chain of
08:20evidence has been welded. Just when the grand jury will take the case up is still a matter of
08:25speculation. Foreman L.H. Beck has called a meeting of the grand jury for next Tuesday, but Solicitor
08:31Dorsey on Saturday declared that the Fagan case would not be considered at that meeting. When asked whether
08:36Conley would be indicted, he said, that is a matter that will come up later.
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