or of the sources, materials, or instruments of evidence by any of the methods which have just been considered, is not, in itself, and necessarily, incompatible with the innocence of the party who is proved to have resorted to such expedients, as will be more fully shown under a future head. Fabrication or Forgery of Evidence. This fabrication is effected in two principal ways: first, indirectly, by intentionally producing on the senses of observers, impressions which shall, without fault on their part, lead to wrong ideas and conclusions, and thus, from the earliest stages, divert suspicion. and inquiry to other objects and into other channels; or, in the event of actual discovery and consequent trial, aid, in the form of testimony, in disproving the criminal charge; secondly, directly, by prevailing upon individuals who, it is supposed or feared, may be called on for information or testimony, to misstate one or more of the facts of the case; or even to state, as facts, what they themselves know to be absolute falsehoods. Conduct, Demeanor, and Language after the Commission of a Crime. The principal criminative circumstances usually classed under this head are, the alarm and confusion of a suspected person in prospect of his discovery; his concealment and flight; his agitation and other conduct on arrest; his silence under accusation; his giving false, evasive, or inconsistent replies to inquiries made of him; his unsatisfactory explanations of suspicious appearances; and his statements of a confessional character, whether judicial or otherwise. II. Infirmative Hypotheses. (1) Suppression of Criminative Objects. The criminative article or appearance sought to be destroyed, suppressed, or eloigned, may have been, in the first instance, fabricated by the real criminal, by placing it in the possession of the innocent party, or even annexing it to his person; and the removal of it may be prompted by the desire of avoiding the effect apprehended to follow from the possession of such an article or appearance. (2) Fabrication or Forgery of Evidence. An innocent person, finding a criminative article such as a blood-stained garment or a bloody knife upon his premises, and naturally (however injudiciously) desiring to rid himself of it, may carry his action farther than mere eloignment or removal, by conveying the article upon the premises of a neighbor; thus actually fabricating evidence against the latter. . . . (3) Giving Different and Inconsistent Accounts of the Cause of the Death of a Person. This fact may be explained, consistently with the innocence of the accused, on the supposition of the statements being merely conjectural, without any claim to the character of accurate information; or on the supposition of the information having been received from various persons, and at different times, or obtained from mere general report. (4) Objecting to the Examination of a Dead Body. The objection, especially in the case of a near relationship to the deceased, may arise from a natural feeling of repugnance against having the body of a friend subjected to anatomical examination. (5) Refusal to look at a Dead Body. This circumstance, also, may be explained on the supposition of a natural feeling of repugnance (which cannot be pronounced uncommon in its occurrence) against looking at the body of a person who has come to a violent end; especially if in a bleeding, mangled, mutilated, or decaying state. A weak or ignorant person might be (6) Alarm in view of Discovery.... led to overrate the effect of circumstances, really immaterial, but seemingly tending to criminate him; and by the exhibition of needless alarm in consequence, actually create against himself evidence to strengthen the force of these very circumstances. ... (7) Concealment and Flight. It may be one of those ordinary cases of simple change of residence in the same community or vicinity, or of departure from it, in pursuit of health, business, or pleasure, which are constantly occurring in all communities. . . . But, supposing it a case of actual concealment or flight, in the proper judicial sense, induced or impelled by a fear of the power of the law, it may have arisen from a source wholly unconnected with the particular crime charged; such as a desire to avoid the service of civil process, or the inquiry into some other offense. Finally, supposing that the observed act of departure or disappearance, on the part of a suspected person, was actually caused by a desire to avoid the charge of having committed the crime which has been discovered, even this circumstance, though proved ever so clearly, is, in itself, by no means conclusive evidence of guilt. Under certain circumstances, the most innocent person may deem a judicial trial too great a risk to encounter. . . (S) Conduct and Language on Arrest; Fear as expressed by Deportment. The force of these manifestations, as criminative circumstances, depends on the correctness of the inference that the particular symptom observed has been produced by the emotion of fear; that is, of fear of detection, or punishment for the offense charged. They may be considered as subject to the following infirmative considerations: The appearance observed may not be the effect or manifestation of any mental emotion whatever, but of a purely physical fact; namely, bodily indisposition. The appearance may be the effect of mental emotion, but of a different emotion from that inferred; such as astonishment, anger, or grief. Supposing the appearance observed to be actually the effect of the emotion of fear; that emotion may be referable to other causes than a consciousness of guilt; thus, It may arise from a consciousness that appearances are against the party, and a consequent apprehension that he may be subjected to judicial annoyance and vexation, or possibly condemned as guilty, although innocent, . . . or, it may arise from an apprehension that a fact which has no criminal character whatever will be publicly exposed, to the injury, mortification, or vexation of the party himself, or some other individual connected with him by some tie of sympathy. Supposing, finally, that the appearance observed is not only, in truth, the effect of the emotion of fear, but that such emotion arises from a consciousness of guilt, . . . it may be a consciousness of some other crime, committed either by himself, or by some other individual connected with him, and on whom the inquiry may bring down suspicion or punishment. Confusion manifested on being charged with participation in the commission of a crime, or questioned as to some circumstance connected or supposed to be connected with it may arise from a feeling of mortification at the discovery of a fact supposed to have been known only to the party himself. The apparently strongly criminative fact of resisting a search of the person may arise from a similar feeling. A story related by Mr. Bentham, as one which he had often heard or read of, may be repeated in his own language, as an illustration of this supposition. "An entertainment was given by some great personage to a numerous and mixed company: in the course of it, a trinket was displayed, the value of which had, by I know not what operation of the principle of association, been raised, in his imagination and affections, above all ordinary estimation. On a sudden, an alarm was given that the precious article was missing. 'Let every man of us be searched,' said one of the company. 'Yes, let every man of us be searched,' said all the rest. One man alone refused: the eyes of all were instantly upon him: his dress betrayed symptoms of penury: no doubt remained about the thief. He entreated and obtained of the master of the house a moment's audience in a private room. His pockets were turned inside out, when in one of them was found not the lost trinket, but something eatable. He had a wife who, for such or such a time, had gone without food." This was a secret, the public exposure of which he had resisted. (9) Silence under Accusation. This circumstance is subject to the following infirmative considerations: The accused or suspected party, owing to deafness, or any other cause, may not have heard the criminative question asked, or observation made. If he heard it, he may not have understood it as conveying an imputation against himself. If he heard and understood it, he may not have been able to reply at the moment, owing to temporary impediment of utterance, or a feeling of surprise at the imputation conveyed. The subject of the statement may have been a matter not within his knowledge. The statement may have been made under circumstances not calling for a reply. (10) Evasive and Incomplete Response. The following infirmative considerations may be mentioned under this head: It may be a case where the appearance observed, and required to be explained, such as blood on the clothing, although criminative on its face, was not so in fact; but the accused having been subjected to it without his knowledge, as by having come in contact with a bleeding body in the dark, was, although innocent, actually unable to explain its existence. It may be a case where the accused, though innocent, could only explain particular circumstances, by criminating other individuals whom he was unwilling to expose, or disclosing facts which he was anxious, if possible, to conceal. It may be a case where the accused, though not guilty of the offense charged, could only prove himself so by showing his guilt of some other offense. It may have been considered by the accused his best policy not to disclose the particulars of his defense, until judicially demanded of him on his trial. (11) False Response. It may be attributable to the same cause which has sometimes led innocent persons to resort to false evidence in their defense, as by actually fabricating facts and appearances, in order to produce false impressions. 149. THE ESCAPED CONVICT'S CASE. (H. L. ADAM. The Story of Crime. 19-. p. 171.) . . Some time ago, a prisoner who escaped from Dartmoor was recaptured in a curious manner. He had succeeded in getting beyond the boundaries of the prison property, had secured a change of clothing, and was within an ace of getting clear away. He had to pass a police station, and as he approached it, he observed a police constable standing outside with a dog. Pulling himself together he put on indifference and managed to pass the policeman without raising his suspicions. Having got a few yards away, he suddenly heard the dog bark behind him and run towards him. Thinking that the policeman had "spotted" him, he took to his heels. This brought the policeman after him, and he was taken. The dog was merely barking at him as dogs will bark at passing people, and it was not until he ran away that the policeman's suspicions were aroused. . . . Some years ago a schoolmaster was found murdered in his study. He had been hit over the head with a blunt instrument. The assistant master, who it was proved had been enamored of his employer's wife, was arrested and charged with the crime. The theory propounded by the prosecution was as follows. At the time the crime was committed the pupils were playing in the open ground adjoining the school, and the assistant master was with them. The deceased had gone into his study to seek a little repose, and was dozing. The assistant, so the prosecution argued, left the pupils, crept noiselessly into the house, secured the weapon, made his way to the study, committed the crime, rejoining the pupils in the playground as though nothing had happened. The defense, however, were able, by means of timing the man's supposed movements, to make it appear a physical impossibility for him to have committed the deed in the manner set forth. But the most pregnant evidence of all was that which turned on a mere trifle. One of the witnesses for the prosecution was a small boy, a pupil, who testified that he saw the prisoner emerge from the house and come up to the boys as they were tossing coins in the air. He exclaimed, said the witness, "You don't know how to toss coins, let me show you," at the same time taking hold of a coin and spinning it in the air. Whereupon the judge put this question to the witness, "Did the prisoner's hand shake?" to which the witness replied that it did not. That practically saved the prisoner's life; if the reply had been in the affirmative, it would probably have sealed his fate. The judge argued that it was highly improbable that a man could come fresh from such a violent deed as that and toss a coin in the air without his hand shaking. Opinions, however, will differ on this point. 150. MULLINS' CASE. (ARTHUR GRIFFITHS. Mysteries of Police and Crime. 1898. Vol. I, p. 23.) ... Criminals continually "give themselves away" by their own carelessness, their stupid, incautious behavior. It is almost an axiom in detection to watch the scene of a murder for the visit of the criminal, who seems almost irresistibly drawn thither. The same impulse attracts the French murderer to the Morgue, where his victim lies in full public view. This is so thoroughly understood in Paris that the police keep officers in plain clothes among the crowd which is always filing past the plate-glass windows separating the public from the marble slopes on which the bodies are exposed. An Indian criminal's steps generally lead him homeward to his own village, on which the Indian police set a close watch when a man is much wanted. Numerous instances might be quoted in which offenders disclose their crime by ill-advised ostentation: the reckless display of much cash by those who were, seemingly, poverty-stricken just before; selfindulgent extravagance; throwing money about wastefully; not seldom parading in the very clothes of their victims. A curious instance of the neglect of common precaution was that of Wainwright, the murderer of Harriet Lane, who left the corpus delicti, the damning proof of his guilt, to the prying curiosity of an outsider, while he went off in search of a cab. One of the most remarkable instances of the want of reticence in a great criminal and his detection through his own foolishness occurred in the case of Mullins, the Stepney murderer, who betrayed himself to the police when they were really at fault, and their want of acuteness was the subject of much caustic criticism. The victim in this case was an aged woman of eccentric character and extremely parsimonious habits, who lived entirely alone, only admitting a woman to help her in the housework for an hour or two every day. . . . She was last seen on the evening of the 13th of August. When people came to see her on business on the 14th, 15th, and 16th, she made no response to their loud knockings, but her strange habits were well known; moreover, the neighborhood was so densely inhabited that it was thought impossible she could have been the victim of foul play. At last, on August 17th, a shoemaker, named Emm, whom she sometimes employed to collect rents at a distance, went to Mrs. Elmsley's lawyers and expressed his alarm at her non-appearance. The police were consulted, and decided to break into the house. Its owner was found lying dead on the floor in a lumber room at the top of the house. Life had been extinct for some days, and death had been caused by blows on the head with a heavy plasterer's hammer. The body lay in a pool of blood, which also splashed the walls, and a bloody footprint was impressed on the floor, pointing outwards from the room. There were no appearances of forcible entry to the house, and the con clusion was fair that whoever had done the deed had been admitted by Mrs. Elmsley in all good faith. Yet the police made no useful deductions from these data. While they were still at fault, a man, named Mullins, a plasterer by trade, who knew Mrs. Elmsley well and who had often worked for her, came forward voluntarily to throw some light on the mystery. A month had nearly elapsed since the murder, and during this long period Mullins' attention had been drawn to the man Emm and his suspicious conduct. Mullins had served in the Irish constabulary; his powers of observation had been quickened by this early training, and he soon saw that Emm had something to conceal. thing to conceal. He had watched him, had frequently seen him leave his cottage and proceed stealthily to a neighboring brickfield, laden on each occasion with a parcel he did not bring back. Mullins, after giving this information quite unsought, led the police officers to the spot, and into a ruined outbuilding, where a strict search was made. Behind a stone slab they discovered a paper parcel containing articles which were at once identified as part of the murdered woman's property. Mullins next accompanied the police to Emm's house, and saw the supposed criminal arrested. But to his utter amazement the police turned on Mullins and also took him into custody. Something in his manner had aroused suspicion; and rightly, for eventually he was convicted and hanged for the crime. Here Mullins had only himself to thank. Whatever the impulsethat strange restlessness that often affects the secret murderer, or the consuming fear that the scent was hot, and his guilt must be discovered unless he could shift suspicion it is certain that but for his own act he would never have been arrested. It may be interesting to complete this case, and show how further suspicion settled around |