A Rank Farce

New York, 1895

Put another farce down to the credit of the District Attorney's office. Charles J. Sharkey of Flushing was tried in the court of Oyer and Terminer on Tuesday, before Judge Brown, on the charge of having killed his mother by poisoning her. The District Attorney was unable to make out any case at all, and Judge Brown ordered the jury to return a verdict of acquittal, which they did without leaving their seats.

The accused man was indicted more than a year ago, and has been kept in jail awaiting trial ever since. This fact ought to make people shudder. It is a serious reflection on the administration of justice, especially as the District Attorney must have known, if he studied the case at all, or is competent to judge, that it was impossible for him to secure a conviction. The wretched weakness of the case is shown in the direction of a verdict of acquittal without requiring the accused to offer a syllable of testimony.

This case has cost the county several thousand dollars. The sum of $1,000 was paid to a New York chemist for an analysis of the stomach when no such analysis was required, for the physicians who made the autopsy found in the stomach arsenic enough to kill a score of people.

—The Long Island Farmer, Jamaica, NY, May 3, 1895, p. 4.