On January 28th, 1936, Richard Loeb was slashed to death with a straight razor by inmate James Day. The case against Day went to trial in June of that year and Day was acquitted, but there is still a lot of mystery surrounding Loeb’s death.
I visited the Will County Court archives to look for a transcript, but they didn’t have a copy, so I did the next best thing: I went through every newspaper I could find that reported on the trial and copied down every quote they gave. As you’ll see, these often include quotes other papers left out and sometimes contradict each other, but it’s the best I can do unless an actual transcript surfaces.
If something’s in italics, those are my words, usually I’m paraphrasing something that wasn’t a direct quote. If something isn’t in italics it’s a direct quote from the newspaper.
Abbreviations for newspapers/wire services:
AP: Associated Press
CDN: Chicago Daily News
CDT: Chicago Daily Times
CEA: Chicago Evening American
CHE: Chicago Herald Examiner
CT: Chicago Tribune
JEHN: Joliet Evening Herald-News
Initials used:
AH: Guard Captain Austin Humphrey
AR: Abe Rudsky
CM: Charles McKeown (Lawyer for the State)
DJD: Dr. Joseph Duffy
EB: Emmett Byrne (One of Day’s lawyers)
EK: E. A. Kingston (Will County Coroner)
EP: Edwin G. Powers
ES: Edward Sklepkowski
EW: Judge Edwin Wilson
FC: Dr. Frank J. Chmelik
FJ: Guard Captain Frank R. Johnson
GB: George Bliss
HL: Harold Levy (One of Day’s lawyers)
JD: James Day
JL: Dr. John Larson
JR: Warden Joseph Ragen
JS: Joseph Schwab
RD: Richard Dittman
VW: Victor Walinski
WH: Walter Herschbach (Lawyer for the State)
Jump to the dates or testimony of specific people by clicking the links below
January 29th
General Description
Warden Joseph Ragen
John Larson
Joseph Duffy
Frank Chmelik
James Day
Austin Humphrey
Frank Johnson
Closing Remarks
Jury Verdict
June 1st
Opening Statements
General
Bert Sinchely
Edward Sklepkowski
Austin Humphrey
Carl Mueller
James Kelly
Abe Rudsky
Joseph Ragen
Gale Swolley
Harry Beegahm
Thomas Ney
Frank Chmelik
Robert Duffy
June 2nd
James Day’s Statement
General
Doctors, General
Richard Dittman
Victor Walinski
George Bliss
Robert Camy
James Corcoran
June 3rd
James Day
Rebuttal Witnesses
Charles McKeown’s Closing Argument
June 4th
Walter Herschbach’s Closing Argument
Harold Levy’s Closing Argument
Emmett Byrne’s Closing Argument
Sentence
January 29th: Coroner’s Inquest
General Description
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
Convict James Day was a broken, hysterical figure today at the inquest which ended when a jury ordered him held for the murder of Convict Richard Loeb.
Testimony leading to the verdict was featured by Day’s own refusal to talk, Warden Ragen’s insistence that the death-dealing razor was not stolen from the prison barber shop, and occasional references to “improper proposals” made to Day by Dickie Loeb.
The small ante-room off Assistant Warden Browning Robinson’s office was crowded with officials, witnesses and newspapermen. Photographers were reluctantly permitted to take pictures of young Day.
He was slight and pathetic in a denim shirt and dark trousers that were too large for him. He puffed nervously at a cigarette. His left eye was discolored.
The breath of scandal hung heavy over the scene and thickened as a Stateville official said “privately” while the jury was deliberating:
“I estimate that 85 per cent of the Negro prisoners and 55 to 60 per cent of the whites at Stateville are addicted to some form of perversion. This makes it necessary for us to constantly shift the cellmates.”
(Chicago Tribune, January 30, 1936)
The inquest was conducted by Will County Coroner E. A. Kingston in a room adjoining Warden Ragen’s office.
Warden Joseph Ragen
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
EK: You were here yesterday when Loeb was killed?
JR: Yes.
EK: In your own way state the facts to the jury.
JR: I was eating about 12:30. I was called to the hospital and there on the operating table I found Loeb, cut very many times. The doctors were already there working with him, but he died a little after 3 o’clock.
EK: Please tell the jury if any report of this matter was given you by your subordinate officers.
JR: Capt. Humphrey said that he had been in the captain’s office about fifteen feet south of the bathroom of the room formerly used as the officers’ eating house. He was called by an inmate, who said there had been a fight.
He investigated and found Day with a razor. He ordered him detained and then went to the hospital, where he found Loeb.
EK: What’s the record of both men?
JR: Loeb’s record has been perfect. Day’s record shows only minor infractions up to yesterday.
(CHE, January 30, 1936)
Ragen said he was first informed of the stabbing by Humphrey.
JR: They had no business being there. It was originally an officer’s shower, and no inmate was supposed to use it.
Powers took up questioning and got another admission that inmates had “no right whatever” to be in the room.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
Ragen said Loeb’s record was “perfect” and Day’s showed “small violations of rules, but no gross offenses.”
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
EK: Had the men had any trouble?
JR: Only what Day told me.
EK: He made these statements after yesterday?
JR: Yes.
EK: Neither man had been brought before you before that?
JR: No.
EK: You say the two men were in this bathroom when the trouble took place. Had either the privilege of going in there?
JR: No.
EK: Do the inmates use this bathroom toilet?
JR: No. It is being taken out.
EK: Do you know whether Mr Loeb and Mr Day were supposed to be locked in their cells at this time?
JR: No. Day works in the front office. He goes to his cell, then back to the front office after the noon meal. He is due back in the front office at 1 o’clock. Loeb at this time would be in the rooms which we are remaking into a school room.
EK: Did Loeb have a time at which he must report?
JR: No. he was in charge of an officer.
The coroner told Warden Ragen that would be all for the present.
Edwin G. Powers, chief investigator for state’s attorney’s office took up questioning Warden Ragen.
EP: Wasn’t there a key to this room found?
JR: Yes.
…
JR: I will welcome an investigation not only by the coroner but by the state’s attorney. No special privileges have been granted to any prisoner. Conditions in the prison are much better now than at any other time, and there is nothing improper in the care and treatment of the prisoners. Loeb had had access to the suite, which was formerly the officer’s mess, for only a week. The reason was that the correspondence school, which Loeb and Leopold operated, was being transferred from cellhouse C. That cellhouse is noisy and unsuitable for a school, so we decided to use the suite off the main dining room. Since I came to the prison in October 14, 1935, Leopold and Loeb have been mentioned in reports of unnatural practices, but guards were unable to obtain any evidence of that nature.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
EP: He had no right to the room, but it was discovered later that he had a key to it, wasn’t it?
JR: That’s what they told me.
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
EP: You heard that Day had trouble Friday? That he had received a black eye?
JR: I did not know that until after yesterday’s trouble.
EP: Who has the supervision of Day?
JR: The officers take him from his office work to his cell.
EP: Whose duty is it to investigate trouble here?
JR: Any officer.
EP: Did any officer report Day’s black eye?
JR: No.
EP: Yesterday, who was first notified-I mean outside the institution?
JR: I called the doctors.
EP: Had you seen the extent of Loeb’s wounds?
JR: Yes.
EP: When did you notify the state’s attorney’s office?
JR: Oh, about 3:30.
EP: After Loeb was dead?
JR: Yes.
EP: Any reason for not notifying the state’s attorney’s office sooner?
JR: No. We notified them as soon as we got around to it. We had nothing to hide.
EP: One time a short time ago you had another killing here, didn’t you?
JR: Yes.
EP: And the state’s attorney was not notified until after the man had died?
JR: I wasn’t even in the state when it happened.
EP: At that time wasn’t there some talk as to whether the state’s attorney should be advised?
JR: I’ve no quarrel with the state’s attorney’s office. Why should I call you immediately? You’re no doctor. I wanted to save the man’s life, if possible.
At this juncture the coroner broke in:
EK: I don’t think this line of questioning means anything.
EP: There are too many reporters present here for us to argue.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
EP: Was there any reason that the state’s attorney’s office wasn’t notified of this until Loeb was dead?
JR: No particular reason. We had nothing to hide. You were notified when he got around to it.
EK: What difference does it make? The state’s attorney couldn’t do anything about it.
EP: There are too many reporters present for us to argue, doctor.
(CHE, January 30, 1936)
Powers questioned Ragen sharply about why his office hadn’t been notified at once.
JR: We were able to handle everything, all right.
Kingston interrupted when Powers tried to question Ragen about a fatal stabbing in the prison some months ago when the office also wasn’t notified, saying he didn’t think it made any difference.
EP: Ragen had a good reason for not notifying us.
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
EP: You talked to Day didn’t you?
JR: Day said they met in the bathroom and both stripped. Loeb asked him, Day said, to submit to an indecent action, which he refused. He said Loeb had a razor and started toward him. Day said he kicked Loeb in the groin, seized the razor, and slashed at him as Loeb ran out of the room.
EP: Did Day tell you he had knocked at Loeb’s cell before lunch to talk with Loeb?
JR: He didn’t tell me.
EP: Did you find out where the razor came from?
JR: No.
EP: Is this razor from the barber shop?
JR: I don’t know. Since coming here I and my officers have found a couple bushel of knives and sharp weapons. The razor used to kill Loeb did NOT come from the barber shop.
(CDT, January 29, 1936)
Ragen revealed the razor was not the same as the one that went missing from the barber shop last Tuesday. He said that his investigation showed that it was a razor which had been missing from the barber shop in F house since November.
JR: There are a number of razors missing and around the prison somewhere.
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
EP: Did Day say how many times he cut Loeb?
JR: He said four or five times.
EP: Did Day tell you the razor changed hands during the scuffle?
JR: He said Loeb had the razor three or four times.
EP: Did the doctors examine Day for wounds?
JR: Yes. Dr. John A. Larson, assistant state criminologist, examined Day and found none.
John Larson
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
The warden was excused and Larson took the stand, questioned by Coroner Kingston.
EK: Have you examined the mental and physical condition of this man Day? What did you find?
JL: My findings are incomplete at present, but I have the impression that Day is not insane in the legal sense. But he is emotionally unstable, and yesterday’s episode appeared in the nature of a panic reaction. This confirmed by the previous history of his case.
Examined July 7, 1934, his mental health was diagnosed as egocentric personality. He was treated between May 16 and June 30, 1932, for hysteria, appearing as paralysis in his left arm. Yesterday’s examination showed him to be unstable. He co-operated in every way, but when the time came for him to do simple calculations, which I know he should be able to do, because of his intelligence, could not do them. He would become embarrassed and laugh. The laugh was hysterical.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
JL: I felt from my examination of him that he was not psychotic or insane in the legal sense, but emotionally unstable. The episode he described to me appeared in the nature of a panic reaction.
Day was an “egocentric personality” who had been treated in Pontiac in 1932 for hysteria.
EP: Did Day strike you as a pervert?
JL: He did not.
…
JL: [Day] has a panic reaction to episodes.
(CHE, January 30, 1936)
Larson said that Day was “not psychotic” although of a “very emotional and unstable type.”
(CDT, January 29, 1936)
Larson said Day was not insane but right after the fight showed “symptoms of panic reaction.” Said Day shouted “Give me air! Give me air!” when being taken to prison hospital. Day had an “egocentric personality” and in 1932 was treated for a period of several months for “hysteria paralysis” of the right arm. Apparently had been cured of the ailment.
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
EK: What was the condition of Day when you saw him?
JL: His left eye was bruised and discolored. He had a skin burn across the left side of his kidneys. His right forearm was bruised and the pupils of his eyes were dilated. He was brought into my office on a truck and he was screaming and shouting: ‘Give me air.’ I steadied him down for an interview.
Powers took up the questioning.
EP: Were you there when any other doctor examined Loeb?
JL: No, I was not.
EP: Did you examine Day’s black eye to see how long ago it occurred?
JL: In my impression, it was made a few days ago.
EP: In regard to the bruises and scratches on his body?
JL: My attendants did that.
Larson said that Day was “emotionally unstable,” and not a sexual pervert in his impression. His investigation disclosed that Day had been “very apprehensive” for many weeks, fearing a “sex problem” and neither ate nor slept well.
Joseph Duffy
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
Larson was excused and Dr. Joseph Duffy, resident physician at Stateville prison, took the stand. Dr. Kingston questioned him.
EK: Were you on duty yesterday afternoon when Loeb was attacked?
DJD: Yes. By the time I got to Loeb he was on the operating table. Examination showed cuts all over his body, wounds on his neck from the left ear to the right ear, deep lacerations on his abdomen. Two doctors were sewing up his abdomen, legs and back. Another doctor and myself gave him blood transfusions.
EK: Was the wound at his neck into the jugular vein?
DJD: Yes.
EK: Did he die on the operating table?
DJD: Yes.
EK: How many cuts or lacerations did Loeb have on his body?
DJD: I would say between fifty and fifty-six.
EK: Which was the most serious?
DJD: Around the neck and abdomen.
EK: Did you have any occasion to examine Loeb any time in the last few days?
DJD: I never did before.
EK: Did you notice any bruises on Loeb’s body that might not have occurred yesterday?
DJD: No.
EK: Did you examine Day?
DJD: Yes. I found a scratch on the left hand of the index finger. A sort of burn over his left kidney, 8 or 10 inches long, and a swelling over his left eye.
EK: Did the swelling over the eye appear to have happened yesterday or several days ago?
DJD: It looked like it might have occurred prior to yesterday.
EK: Did you make any further examination?
DJD: Yes, sir. His pulse was very bad.
EK: How about his mental condition?
DJD: Seemed to be all right.
EK: Did you ask Day in regard to when he got his black eye?
DJD: Day told me he got it yesterday.
EK: Are you positive about that?
DJD: I am positive.
EK: Assuming he had a fight Friday, would a blow over the eye still show up?
DJD: I believe it would.
EK: What do you believe was the cause of the scratch on his finger?
DJD: It might have been caused by a pin. It was very superficial.
EK: What time did you work on Loeb?
DJD: At 12:50 p.m.
[one line lost, paper damaged]
EK: – doctors must be in prison at all times?
DJD: In the past I was here in the morning, and Dr. Brandon was here in the afternoon.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
According to Duffy Loeb had fifty-two wounds. Principal ones, the doctor thought, were those in the throat, one of which went from ear to ear and into the windpipe, and that around the abdomen and back. Hardly a square inch of Loeb’s body was unscathed. Day’s only marks were a friction burn over his kidney, where Loeb had kicked him, and a laceration on his right hand, plus the black eye he got in a fight last Friday.
(CDT, January 29, 1936)
Loeb had apparently died from the one deep gash which had opened his windpipe. Duffy said that 5 specialists had been hastily summoned to try to save Loeb’s life, two throat specialists working on his throat and 3 other surgeons sewing up the other cuts on his body.
DJD: Loeb didn’t say a thing all the time-he couldn’t. But he did smile several times.
Duffy told how seven doctors, as well as specialists from the Michael Reese Hospital, fought vainly to save Loeb’s life.
DJD: He could only smile. A throat specialist had inserted a tube which prevented his speaking.
(Chicago Tribune, January 30, 1936)
Duffy said there were 56 slashes on Loeb, from one inch to two feet long. The physician told of a convict, not yet identified, donating blood for a transfusion in an effort to save Loeb’s life. Said he was certain the dead man was Loeb.
Frank Chmelik
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
Dr. Duffy was excused. Dr. Frank J Chmelik took the stand. The coroner examined him and asked him to tell of attending Loeb.
EK: What in your opinion do you believe his mental condition was?
FC: Very good. He was very polite at all times and seemed to be a gentleman. He always appeared in good humor.
EK: Did you know if this man you attended was the prisoner Loeb?
FC: Yes, he was; I’m positive.
EK: Did Loeb say anything to you when you first attended him?
FC: Only he smiled at me when I came toward the table.
(Chicago Tribune, January 30, 1936)
Chmelik is certain the dead man was Loeb.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
Chmelik is assigned to the Joliet prison.
FC: When I walked in he smiled at me. He was pale and suffering from severe shock. I ordered a light anesthetic for him.
The cuts he described as “clean, and all the way to the bone.”
James Day
(Chicago Tribune, January 30, 1936)
Day was wearing prison denim and appeared calm.
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
Convict Day was sworn in. Coroner Kingston took up the questioning.
EK: You were in a mixup with Convict Loeb yesterday, as the result of which Loeb died?
JD: Yes.
At this point the coroner warned Day that any testimony he gave at this inquiry might be used against him in case of a trial.
EK: I must warn you of your constitutional right. You can refuse to answer questions. We cannot and do not intend to force you to give the information. If you want to tell us, it is O.K. You can refuse to talk. What would you care to do?
JD: I’ve nothing to say.
Twitching nervously, he added, half hysterically:
JD: My life has been miserable since I came here.
EK: Do you or don’t you want to [missing]
(JEHN, January 29, 1936)
A squatty, stoop-shouldered youth, was informed by Kingston that he did not legally have to testify and was asked if he wanted to do so. Day smiled faintly and said:
JD: I don’t know what to do.
Kingston again reminded him that he could do as he saw fit. Then Day blurted:
JD: I’ve been miserable ever since I’ve been in this place!
He was interrupted by Kingston before saying anything further, who again asked if he desired to testify formally. Calm again, he said:
JD: No. I’ve nothing to say now, but I will later.
(CDT, January 29, 1936)
Day was brought in, had been nervously puffing cigarette after cigarette. Kingston said he didn’t have to speak because of constitutional rights and Day said he’d been miserable since he was placed in prison.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
Day made a short and dramatic appearance before the coroner’s jury. He is slight of stature, with a wedge face, and the frightened eyes of the street corner youth always on the lookout for the squad car. He is pale of face with sunken eyes and a mass of wavy brown hair.
He slumped into a chair in the crowded administration office. He was dressed in blue pants and a striped denim shirt.
Dr. E. A. Kingston, coroner of Will county, advised Day, who writhed in his chair, twisting a dirty handkerchief, that he did not have to testify, if he did not wish to, that even an inmate of the “big house” has constitutional rights.
Young Day looked a little bewildered, and was obviously working up to an emotional crisis.
Dr. Kingston again intoned the conventional warning to the killer at the inquest.
Day then became hysterical, his voice hitting a high pitch.
JD: All I want to say is that life has been miserable for me ever since I came here.
EK: Do you wish to testify?
JD: No, I’ll talk later, but not now.
Day, making a rapid recovery of his composure and was taken back to his cell.
(CDT, January 29, 1936)
JD: My life has been miserable ever since I came here.
Austin Humphrey
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
Day was then excused and Capt. Austin Humphrey took the stand. Answering routine questions, he said he lives at Stateville, where he is chief captain. [questioner not stated, though it was likely Kingston].
Q: Tell us what you know of the rumpus which ended with the death of Loeb.
AH: I was sitting in the captain’s office yesterday when an inmate ran down to me and said: “There’s been a man cut.” I ran out to the main tunnel, where I saw two inmates carrying a man through the tunnel toward the hospital. Another inmate said: “It happened in there.” I went back to the bathroom to which the convict pointed, and opened the door. Day was standing inside. He handed me a razor and said: “Captain, this is what I done it with.” I then ordered other inmates to get a truck and take Day also to the hospital.
Q: Where were you at the time of the rumpus?
AH: In the captain’s office, about fifty feet away.
Q: Was either man under your direct charge?
AH: No.
Q: Who was their officer?
AH: Capt. Johnson and the cellhouse keeper, Mr. Fleming.
Q: Had you seen either man before they went into the shower room?
AH: No.
Q: Did Day offer any explanation?
AH: Day told me Loeb had been trying to use him for some time, and Loeb had got him a job in the records office.
Q: Did he say how he came to be in the room with Loeb?
AH: No.
Q: Were the men in the habit of using this room to take a shower bath?
AH: No.
Q: Were all inmates privileged to use this shower?
AH: No. Only the school students.
Q: Then both men were entitled to use this shower?
AH: Yes.
Q: Is this an unusual custom, to take a shower during the day here?
AH: Yes, we try to keep them at fixed hours.
Q: Is there anything unusual in their being there?
AH: No.
Q: Was Day clothed?
AH: He had only a shirt on.
Q: Were there any marks of physical violence on his body?
AH: Only a black eye, which he got in a fight a week ago.
Q: You know and can swear that the black eye is not recent?
AH: It is not recent.
Chief Investigator Powers broke in.
EP: Describe the location, size and contents of this bathroom?
AH: As you go from the tunnel, which is about twenty feet west of the main entrance to the dining room, it’s about 6 feet by 8 or 10 feet. It has a shower.
EP: Is the floor of the room all on the same level?
AH: Yes.
EP: What was the condition inside the room?
AH: Day’s clothing was scattered on the floor. There were signs of a scuffle. There was blood on the walls, floor and curtains and in front of the shower bath. In the back of the room away from the door there were no signs of fighting.
EP: Did Day say who went to the bathroom first, and how he happened to go?
AH: Day said he went there first, and found the door unlocked. Loeb followed in about five minutes. I asked him how long the fight had been going on and Day said: “It seemed like years.”
EP: Who had the key to the bathroom yesterday?
AH: I don’t know. When I found it, it was on the inside of the door.
EP: Did Day say how it got there?
AH: He said Loeb locked the door from the inside when he came in.
EP: Where did he get the key?
AH: I don’t know.
EP: After the rumpus, who unlocked the door?
AH: Day said Loeb unlocked it.
EP: At that time were there any extraordinary noises?
AH: Yes.
EP: Would it be impossible to hear the scuffle?
AH: Yes. The door fits tightly.
Handing the official the razor used to kill Loeb, the coroner asked that it be identified.
EP: Did both men live in the same cell house?
AH: Yes. In Cellhouse C.
EP: Were barbers assigned to the cellhouses?
AH: Yes.
EP: Where were the convicts shaved, in their cells?
AH: No. Outside, in sight of officers.
EP: And razors are issued daily to the barbers?
AH: Yes. Two to each, to be returned and checked in each night, however.
EP: And all razors are accounted for?
AH: Every one in every cellhouse.
EP: Is this the same type of razors used by the barbers here?
AH: It has the same trade name.
EP: Are inmates permitted to have their own razors?
AH: No. Not in their cells.
Powers and the coroner began a fairly heated argument about the razor.
EP: Then this is not the missing razor?
EK: No. This is not. The razor which is missing has been gone since last November.
JR: There have been razors missing three or four years.
AH: You are liable to miss anything around here.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
Humphrey quoted Day as saying to him: “Ever since I’ve been in here Loeb’s been trying to bother me.” Day handed him the razor peaceably, he said. The bathroom showed signs of a terrific struggle. The razor was not the type used by the prison barbers. He had no idea where it could have come from. He confirmed that a razor had been missing and never accounted for.
(CHE, January 30, 1936)
Humphrey told of being informed of the killing by a prison “trusty.” He rushed out into the corridor in time to see Day emerge from the shower room with the razor, and seized him.
AH: Loeb’s influence got Day his job in the chief clerk’s office.
He explained of the shower “it was for the exclusive use of the teachers in the prison school.” This meant Loeb, Leopold and other assistant teachers.
Asked about the key for the bathroom he said he “thought the keeper at Cellhouse C was supposed to take care of it.”
(JEHN, January 29, 1936)
Loeb had recommended and succeeded in getting Day a position as a record clerk in the front office. This was explained by authorities who said that recommendations for such positions came from the heads of the prison school, who furnished capable students for the work.
Humphrey said he was sitting in his office in the dining room at 12:15 when an inmate ran in to tell him there had been a stabbing. he said he ran out of the office to see two inmates carrying Loeb to the tunnel leading to the hospital. Informed that the trouble had occurred in the bathroom, he went there, reaching it just as Day came out carrying a razor in his hand.
Day told the captain that he had knifed Loeb and then staggered backward as if to faint. He was also taken to the hospital. Humphrey said Day told him that Loeb had been endeavoring to compel him to submit to improper advances for many months and that Day said he got to the bathroom 5 minutes before Loeb entered and locked the door from the inside. Day told him Loeb commanded him to remove his clothes and he complied. Loeb also disrobed, then threatened Day with the razor while they were taking showers.
Frank Johnson
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
Capt. Frank R. Johnson, the captain in charge at Stateville followed Humphrey on the stand. [Questioner not identified, though it was likely Kingston at the beginning]
Q: You saw Loeb yesterday? Did he make any statement?
FJ: No, he was seriously cut.
Q: Were you in charge of Loeb and Day?
FJ: Not directly, only as captain of the whole thing here.
Q: Has there been any report of previous trouble?
FJ: No.
Q: At the time of this rumpus was there noise in the dining room?
FJ: At about this time we had just finished feeding 1,700 men on the second line, and naturally there was considerable commotion.
Investigator Powers took a hand in the questioning.
EP: Who had charge of the bathroom key?
FJ: I couldn’t say, perhaps the dining room keeper.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
EP: Who had charge of the key to the bathroom?
FJ: The keeper in charge of the dining room should have had it.
He added he did not know who was in charge yesterday.
(CDT, January 29, 1936)
He said that the bathroom key “should have been in possession of the keeper in the dining room.” He did not know this keeper’s name.
(CHE, January 30, 1936)
About the bathroom key: he “guessed the keeper of the dining hall took care of it.”
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
EP: Did these two men have access to the shower?
FJ: Yes. When the men are working and get dirty they have the privilege of taking showers.
Closing Remarks
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
Johnson was the last witness heard. Coroner Kingston instructed the jury, making repeated use of the words “accident” and “accidental.” To this, Chief Investigator Powers mildly objected. The coroner insisted:
EK: It has not been shown here it was not an accident. But it is the jury’s duty to decide that. They can hold him for manslaughter, murder, or decide it was a case of self-defense.
Discussing the wounds in Loeb’s body, after the inquest had been closed and the jury was forming its verdict, the coroner said:
EK: As a doctor of thirty-three years’ experience, I have never seen a man more badly cut up. Why, he had enough cuts in him to kill six men.
(Chicago Tribune, January 30, 1936)
The coroner instructed the jury. In his instructions he mentioned the word “accident.” Powers hurried forward.
EP: I must have misunderstood you, Mr. Coroner. This was murder and we want this man held for murder.
(CDN, January 29, 1936)
Powers related to the coroner’s jury: “Day told me he met Loeb in the shower room. He said they stripped. Loeb then asked him to submit to an indecent act, which he refused. Day said Loeb then came up with a razor, and he kicked Loeb in the groin. They fought for several minutes. Day claims the razor changed hands several times in the scuffle, at least three times.”
Jury Verdict
(CEA, January 29, 1936)
We, the jury, find that Richard Loeb came to his death from shock and extenuation as a result of multiple cuts and lacerations secured in a fight between Richard Loeb and one James Day in a washroom off the dining hall at the Stateville Penitentiary, Rockport Township, Will County, Illinois, at about 12:30 p.m., death occurring at the Stateville Hospital at about 3:10 p.m. of the same day, January 28, 1936.
We, the jurors, find the same James Day guilty of homicide and recommend that he be bound over to the grand jury at the next regular session.
Warren H. North, Foreman.
June 1st
Opening Statements
(CT, June 2, 1936)
WH: Day had asked Loeb to meet him in the bathroom and made all the arrangements. Day was depressed all day; Loeb was very gay. When Loeb arrived at the bathroom Day was already there, and a combat ensued. Day wielded the razor.
At one time Loeb was lying unconscious on the floor, helpless, motionless. Day deliberately took a shower and washed the blood from his body and dried himself with a towel. He heard Loeb moan and saw his start staggering and slashed again with the razor. He took a second shower.
The key was always in the door. As Day slipped on the floor on emerging from the shower, Loeb escaped, staggering from the room. About fifty feet away he fell.
Day’s only injury was a black eye he had received in a fist fight with another prison inmate a few days before.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 1, 1936)
Herschbach said that Loeb “didn’t have a chance,” and that the fight was one sided.
WH: And as Loeb lay helpless in his own blood the deceased regained consciousness and tried to escape from the room. Day then again picked up the razor and slashed and hacked and slashed. Again Loeb dropped unconscious and again the defendant calmly bathed. Then Loeb regained his feet and succeeded in fighting his way out of that slaughter house and only because Day slipped on the bloody floor during the third struggle. At all times, gentlemen, the key to the locked shower room was in the door.
He said that after escaping Loeb staggered 25 feet up a corridor to entrance of Administration building then another 20 feet, where he collapsed at the foot of the Admin building tunnel.
WH: Early on that fateful day, Day had gone to Loeb’s cell, No. 129 in cell block C and arranged the meeting in the shower room which was to cost Loeb his life. Shortly before noon, Day, who had no right to use the shower room, entered through the unlocked door and waited five minutes until Loeb appeared. The state will show that Day, after the butchery, left the shower room and surrendered to two guards. ‘Cap, here is what I did it with,’
He said that just prior to the conflict Loeb was in “his usual cheerful and jovial mood.” While witnesses attest Day was surly and despondent. After fatal combat in that 6×10 shower room Day had no wounds. Had a black eye from a fight some days previously. Said he would show photos taken as Loeb’s body lay in prison dispensary. “And gentlemen, they will speak louder than words.”
(JEHN, June 1, 1936)
Herschbach’s opening statement painted a picture of Day as a cold-blooded murderer. he said the evidence would show that Day took time to wash blood off while Loeb lying unconscious on the floor and that each time Loeb regained consciousness he slashed him again and again. Said Loeb was only able to escape when Day slipped during the fight. he made no mention of the sexual side. He said the bathroom door was unlocked and Loeb had a right to be there but not Day. Said Day waited five minutes to make an appointment set earlier by the pair. “We expect to prove that before the fight Day was sullen, nervous and depressed. While Loeb was in his usual good spirits.” Photos of Loeb’s body “would speak louder than words.”
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
In Herschenbach’s opening statement he said he would prove that Day set up the meeting, was sulky on the way there and waited for Loeb for 5 minutes in the bathroom.
H: Even then Loeb was en route to the prearranged appointment and inmates noted he was in his usual jolly mood.
He said they would show that the bathroom described was a place used by many inmates.
H: But Day was not in that department and had no right to be in that room.
He described the small bathroom in detail, then the fight, saying how Day slashed, then showered, attacked again when Loeb moaned, showered again until Loeb escaped. Day’s only wound was a black eye he’d gotten from a previous fight. He bore down heavily on the photos of Loeb’s body.
(CDN, June 1, 1936)
In Herschbach’s opening statement he said he would not let the jury forget that Day’s work with a razor was full of deliberation and took 2 showers between rounds of the fight. He said he would show that Day had no scratches, while Loeb had razor slashes across his back, deep in his throat, at the base of his skull and other areas. He promised to show jury photos of Loeb’s body taken in pen morgue.
H: These pictures will speak louder than words.
H: The state expects to show that on January 28, 1936, in Stateville, the defendant, James Day, killed Richard Loeb on or about noon in a certain combat that took place in a toilet room. The state expects further to show that on the morning of that day the defendant came to Loeb’s cell and asked if he could see him during the day. We expect to show also that during the noon hour Richard Loeb and James Day met in Day’s cell, which was removed by one cell from Loeb’s cell in cellhouse C.
We will then take you to the point where Day, standing at the entrance of cellhouse C, had a short conversation with an inmate. We will show that at that time Day was sullen, nervous and depressed. Day then went to the toilet room and waited for five minutes for the arrival of Loeb. We will show that Loeb was in his usual jovial state of mind when he went to the toilet room.
The combat ensued inside the toilet room, Loeb was lying in the back of the room helpless and unconscious. With Loeb’s body in that position, Day proceeded to wash the blood from himself, and to dry his body.
Loeb moaned and started for the doorway. Day then slashed and slashed Richard Loeb some more, by reason of which Richard Loeb was again rendered unconscious.
Day again took a shower and dried himself. Loeb again regained his feet. Day this time slipped on the floor, and Loeb thus succeeded in getting out of the room.
(CDN, June 1, 1936)
James Day’s lawyers Levy and Byrne waived their right to an opening statement.
General
(JEHN, June 1, 1936)
The trial was delayed for 30 mins for a conference in the Judge’s chambers. The State lost a motion to have convicts called as court witnesses-it would have meant that the prosecution would not be bound by what the witnesses said.
(Illinois State Journal, (AP), June 2, 1936)
Five cons testified today, armed deputies kept crowds away while the quintet brought from Stateville. 2 guards stood behind the witness chair as the cons gave testimony. Only Sklepkowski was cross examined.
(CDN, June 4, 1936)
Most of the testimony hoped to show that Loeb was in a good mood and Day wasn’t.
Bert Sinchely
(CT, June 2, 1936)
He was the first witness; the superintendent of identification at Stateville, who identified pictures of Loeb’s body taken in the prison hospital after he died. The pictures showed 53 razor cuts and were admitted into evidence against strenuous defense objections.
Edward Sklepkowski
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
Edward Sklepkowski, Loeb’s male secretary, spent an unpleasant, pouty half-hour on the stand, providing much amusement for the court fans, who embraced every recess as an opportunity to buy pop, ice cream and sandwiches. Sklepkowski answered state questions willingly and defense questions with many an equivocation and an I don’t remember.
He admitted his transfer was a favor and his new job as a runner a favor but indignantly denied they could be traced to Loeb’s friendship.
He said in a low voice that he knew Day, who occupied cell 129 in cellhouse C, while he was Loeb’s cellmate in 131.
ES: I first saw Day on that date in our cell, Loeb, Nathan Leopold, Day and I were there. Day asked Loeb if he could see him that afternoon and Loeb said ‘okay’. I later saw them both in the dining room at lunch but they didn’t talk.
CM: As you observed Day and Loeb in the morning meeting in your cell, what was their attitude toward each other?
Objection, overruled
ES: They were friendly.
He was then cross-examined by the defense.
HL: Where did you live first at Stateville?
ES: Cellhouse B
HL: How long before you met Loeb?
ES: About five months. I met him on the handball court.
HL: What work were you doing?
ES: None
HL: You became Loeb’s runner?
ES: No, I became Professor Fitzgibbon’s runner.
HL: How long after you met Loeb did you get this job?
ES: About six months
HL: How long after the handball meeting were you transferred to Cellhouse C?
ES: About four months
HL: Who became your cellmate?
ES: Loeb
He explained that a runner takes book orders from other inmates and has a paddle/pass to get around. He expressed horror when it was insinuated that Loeb had asked him to cell together. He was never more surprised than when he discovered his old friend of the handball tourneys, with whom he played twice weekly was to be his new cellmate. Sklepkowski mentioned off-handedly that he had been Loeb’s stenographer.
HL: Did you have to do any other work?
ES: No, but I did typing for Loeb. I didn’t have to do this, though.
HL: You just did it because you wanted to?
ES: Yes.
HL: Just a labor of love?
No answer.
Levy tried to show that Sklepkowski had been bribed by a parole offer to testify. Sklepkowski said that he did change his mind about testifying after a visit by Herschbach, McKeon and Powers but “they didn’t offer me a thing. Why, I don’t want parole. I want to remain in prison-about another year, anyway.”
(JEHN, June 1, 1936)
Edward Sklepkowski said he met Loeb while playing handball, he was subjected to a withering cross-exam as the first State witness. He was an alert witness and defied the best efforts of the defense, who tried to prove he had gotten special privileges through his relationship with Loeb.
McKeown started with the state questioning. Sklepkowski said that Day had come to their cell the morning of the fight, where Day requested Loeb see him that afternoon. Nathan Leopold was also present. Sklepkowski said: “They seemed to be friendly.” He said he saw the two together twice during the morning.
Levy asked about Sklepkowski’s history. It was revealed that Sklepkowski knew Day in Pontiac. He said he met Loeb on the handball court while Sklepkowski was “training for a fight.” He was later transferred from B to C cell house and in with Loeb.
HL: Were you Loeb’s runner?
ES: No I wasn’t. I was a runner for Professor Gibbons.
He explained that his job was to take orders from convicts for books and said he had a paddle or pass that allowed him to go about the penitentiary to do this. He said Loeb did not recommend him and he never asked for the job.
HL: Did you do any work for Loeb?
ES: I was not required to do anything
HL: Exactly what did you do for him?
ES: I did most of his typing.
He said he usually typed for Loeb from 4:30-10pm and denied he received compensation for this. It was also revealed that Sklepkowski refused to testify before the grand jury that indicted Day and later changed his mind. Levy could get no reason for the change of mind.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 1, 1936)
ES: Day dropped into our cell and all I heard him say was: ‘I’ll be seeing you this afternoon.’ Dick replied: ‘All right.’ They appeared to be on friendly terms.
(CDN, June 1, 1936)
According to Sklepkowski, as he was getting up Day came into the cell which was occupied by Sklepowski and Loeb, and said to Loeb that he would “see him this afternoon.” Loeb, who was entertaining Nathan Leopold, said “all right.”
Sklepkowski was a surly and unwilling witness for the defense, but he was forced to admit that his fortunes had improved after he met Loeb on handball court.
HL: What were you doing on the handball court?
ES: I was training for a fight.
When he first met Loeb Sklepkowski was in B house, where he was after a transfer from Pontiac upon reaching maturity to complete his 1-10 sentence for larceny.
HL: How long after you met Loeb were you transferred to C House?
ES: About 4 months
HL: Whom did you go to live with?
ES: Dick Loeb.
HL: And after you celled with Loeb a while, you became a runner for Professor Fitzgibbons?
ES: After about a year.
HL: How many men were in Loeb’s cell?
ES: Two-myself and Loeb
HL: And a couple of canary birds
Objection
(CT, June 2, 1936)
CM: You were Loeb’s cellmate
ES: Yes
CM: On the morning of January 28th did you see Day?
ES: Yes. He came to our cell and said to Loeb: ‘I’ll see you this afternoon.’ Loeb said all right.
CM: What was their attitude?
ES: It seemed friendly
On cross Levy brought out that Sklepkowski had been in Stateville for 2 years, serving a 1-10 larceny charge from Chicago. He said he first met Loeb on the handball court a year and a half ago and they had played handball together frequently. He denied he was Loeb’s runner, and said he worked in the grade school.
HL: You became Loeb’s cellmate about a year and a half ago. Who was in the cell besides you two?
ES: Just us two.
HL: And a couple of birds
HL: Did Loeb recommend you for your job in the school?
ES: No, I asked for it.
HL: You didn’t have to do anything for Loeb if you didn’t want to, did you?
ES: No.
HL: But you did his typing?
ES: Yes
Levy tried to bring out that the state had offered to aid Sklepkowski in winning parole if he testified.
ES: I don’t remember anything like that. I don’t want to go before the parole board for another year.
Austin Humphrey
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
Captain of the guards Austin Humphery said he was on duty and had been told of the fight and rushed to the bathroom. He met Day, clothed, emerging from the room with a razor in hand while Loeb, 75 feet away down the tunnel, was being carried off on a stretcher.
On cross Byrne asked what Day said to him “He told me: ‘Cap, here is what I did it with.’ He handed me the razor.” It was a white bone handled straight razor.
EB: What else did Day tell you?
AH: He said Loeb was trying to use him for immoral purposes.
Even the state gasped at this, Byrne forced the blushing captain to use the exact words. He did, the crowd murmuring. A bailiff pounded for order.
Humphrey quoted Day as saying: “I watched my opportunity, kicked him in the groin and grabbed the razor.” Humphrey said the bathroom door locked, the only keys were in the guard office and mess hall.
(Illinois State Journal, (AP), June 2, 1936)
Austin Humphrey quoted Day: “I did it because Loeb wanted to use me for immoral purposes.”
Humphrey said an inmate notified him of the battle and he hurried to the scene. Two other inmates were carrying Loeb toward the hospital, and the captain went to the bathroom.
AH: Day came out as I arrived at the door. He handed me a razor and at the same time he told me ‘This is what I did it with, Cap.’
EB: What else did he say?
AH: I asked what the trouble was and he told me Loeb had tried to use him for immoral purposes.
EB: Are those the exact words Day used?
AH: No
EB: Tell the jury the exact words Day used.
Assured by the court it would be ok, he did.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 1, 1936)
The few women spectators in the jammed courtroom blushed and turned their heads aside at Humphrey’s testimony. Humphrey quoted Day: “Loeb was trying to use me for immoral purposes.” He was obviously embarrassed.
Byrne tried to get exact words from Humphrey. Haltingly, he said: “He was trying to [censored]”
Humphrey quoted Day: “I watched my opportunity and kicked him in the groin. Then I grabbed the razor.” He held the razor aloft. Spectators gasped.
(CHE June 2, 1936)
Captain James A. Humphrey quoted Day: “I had to do it because he was trying to force me to submit to immoral proposals.
CM: Were those Day’s exact words?
AH: No
Hesitatingly he stammered, then blushed when the Judge said it was ok to quote him verbatim. He finally did. Humphrey said Day made the remarks just after Loeb, his body streaming with blood, staggered from shower room.
(CT, June 2, 1936)
AH: Day handed me the razor and declared: ‘This is what I did it with, cap.’
AH: He said Loeb tried to make an illegal assault on him.
AH: Day said he grabbed the razor from Loeb after kicking him.
Carl Mueller
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
Carl Mueller said he met Day as the latter was en route to his bathroom rendezvous with Loeb on January 28. Day, he testified, seemed “a little nervous.”
(CHE June 2, 1936)
Carl Mueller testified that he talked with Day shortly before the killing and he “seemed nervous.”
James Kelly
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
James Kelly, a Chicago robber with a 10-Life sentence was tough and surly. He said the he saw Loeb on his way to the bathroom but noticed nothing unusual about him.
(Illinois State Journal, (AP), June 2, 1936)
James Kelly, a robber with a 1-Life sentence, said he talked to Loeb 10 minutes before the battle and that there was “nothing unusual in his actions.”
Abe Rudsky
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
Abe Rudsky, a con with a 1-14 year sentence for attempted murder, told of seeing Loeb, bleeding and naked, lurch from the bathroom and zig-zag down the tunnel. He ran and told Humphrey.
(Illinois State Journal, (AP), June 2, 1936)
Abe Rudsky, a con employed in officer’s kitchen, said he saw Loeb stagger from the bathroom, “naked and all bloody.” He was dumbfounded and watched as Loeb moved slowly out of sight around a turn in the prison tunnel.
CM: What else did you see?
AR: I looked through the open bathroom door and I saw a man standing there getting dressed. I didn’t know who he was. Then I went to tell the captain.
Joseph Ragen
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
Ragen said Day had no right to be in that bathroom and Loeb did because he worked for the school, though he had no right to have a key.
Gale Swolley
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
Gale Swolley, a convict, said he saw Loeb lying in the tunnel and helped carry him to hospital.
Harry Beegahm
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
Harry Beegahm took a long time on the stand to explain why he had chosen Day as an office worker for morning duty from several other applicants. He denied repeatedly that Loeb influenced his decision, though he admitted that Loeb was a frequent caller at his office.
Dr. Thomas J. Ney
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
Dr. Thomas J Ney, a convict, told of being called in to attend the dying Loeb. He described the more serious wounds inflicted and expressed a belief that his death was caused by hemorrhage and shock.
Dr. Frank Chmelik
(Chicago Daily Times, June 2, 1936)
The last witness for the day was Dr. Frank J. Chmelik. He told of the countless slashes Loeb received, some 4 inches deep.
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
Prison doctor Frank Chmelik agreed with Ney, he said that when Loeb arrived more doctors had to be summoned to speed the work of stitching the wounds. He went into a demonstration of the location of the wounds, using his own torso to point out the foot and a half, three inch deep gash he personally stitched together.
(Decatur Herald (AP), June 2, 1936)
Dr. Frank J Chmelik, summoned to attend Loeb’s wounds, said in his opinion that Loeb died from shock due to loss of blood. He spent more than one hour on the stand describing the multiple wounds on the victim’s body. The most serious of the more than 50 slashes, he said, was one about a foot and a half long and five or six inches deep.
Dr. Robert Duffy
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
The last witness, Robert Duffy, said what his predecessor said almost word for word.
June 2nd
James Day’s Statement
(CEA, June 2, 1936)
James Day’s statement was 16 pages long and read into the record. It was substantially the same as the statement he made to Larson which was made public January 29.
This statement was taken on January 28th by Edward G Powers, in the presence of Ragen, Sheriff Michael Breen, Deputy Thomas Wise and a woman stenographer in Ragen’s office.
Day stated that he was 23, came from Virginia and was sentenced 1-10 for armed robbery, said he had known Loeb since September 1, 1934. He was asked if he wanted to make a statement concerning the ‘trouble’ he had with Loeb.
JD: I don’t know exactly how to do it. I have only one thing to say. The whole story takes an awful long time. I’ve just got one story to tell.
He said he just concluded giving one statement [assumedly with Larson] and had been talking for the last two hours. He hesitated speaking at first because of the presence of the female stenographer.
EP: Well, what did the trouble start about today?
JD: The trouble has been going on for the last fourteen months. It’s all over one question, one thing: it’s only his object to all this trouble.
EP: Well, has he been conducting practices with you?
JD: No.
EP: Has he ever tried to conduct practices with you?
JD: He made suggestions, but he never tried until today.
EP: All right, now just what happened today?
JD: I’ll start with Friday.
EP: That’s January 24?
JD: Friday I had words with another fellow.
EP: Who was that?
JD: I wouldn’t care to mention his name. It was merely an argument, an every-day quarrel and we had a little scrap. That’s how I got my left eye discolored. This was in the a.m.
EP: What do you mean a.m.?
JD: In the morning, and we settled our differences with our fists. And that noon, the same day, Friday the 24th on my way to work right after dinner, I stopped in the chaplain’s office to talk to a fellow who’s a good friend of mind.
EP: Now who was that?
JD: His name is James Corcoran.
EP: Was any of that pertaining to Loeb?
JD: No. While I was talking to him Friday noon Loeb walked in, took his coat off and asked Corcoran to excuse him for a few minutes, that there was something he wanted to settle with Jimmy, meaning me. My cell partner-
EP: What’s his name?
JD: George Bliss was standing in the doorway of the chaplain’s office, his office is only two doors away. He works for the Protestant chaplain. He overheard what Loeb said and interrupted Loeb and asked him if there would be any fisticuffs.
Loeb told him he didn’t know so he told Loeb to let me alone, that I had one fight already that morning and that I wasn’t in a condition to fight with him too, that he could see me about it later. So Loeb said if that’s the case there was always another day and left.
My cell partner, Bliss, saw Loeb the next day and asked him what the trouble was and Loeb wouldn’t say anything, but that he had a few things to settle with me.
EP: Now, did your cell partner, Bliss, communicate that to you?
JD: He told me the next night. He said: ‘I seen Loeb today.’ That was on Saturday, the 25th, and that he asked him to let me alone and he tried to find out why he wanted to bother me. He told me just how it happened.
EP: What did Loeb answer him when Bliss told him to leave you alone?
JD: He told Bliss he would leave me alone for a month, because he asked him to leave me alone, but he didn’t promise not to do anything after that. That’s all he told him. My cell partner, Bliss, told me that night.
EP: Did you see Loeb the next day?
JD: I’d like to tell you this first. Friday night, after Loeb had challenged me to fight, I told both of my cell partners the whole story.
EP: Who is the other one?
JD: Robert Camy.
EP: Now did Camy say anything that Loeb had said anything to him about threatening you?
JD: No
Day said he didn’t see Loeb on Sunday or Monday, the two days before the fight, but saw him on Tuesday morning. After 7:30 wakeup Day stopped at Loeb’s cell, two from his own, where Leopold and Loeb were eating.
JD: I asked Loeb if I could talk to him some time today and he said: ‘Surely,’ very polite about it. Then I left.
EP: Did Leopold say anything?
JD: No, he didn’t say a word.
EP: And then where did you go?
JD: With my line up to the front office here.
EP: What office were you in?
JD: The business manager’s office. H. W. Luthin.
EP: Now, did you have any talk with Loeb from your cell on the way over to your office.
JD: No, he stayed in the cellhouse. He didn’t go with my line. He has his own office in cellhouse C.
EP: When is the next time you saw Loeb?
JD: Right after dinner today.
EP: About what time was that?
JD: About 11:30
EP: And where was it that you saw him?
JD: He came over to my cell.
EP: Was there anybody with him?
JD: No, he was alone.
EP: Anybody in your cell with you?
JD: I was alone.
EP: Was there anybody around so that they could hear what was said between you and Loeb?
JD: No.
EP: What did he say to you?
JD: He told me that he was on his way to take a bath, that he didn’t have time to talk to me in the cellhouse. He told me that he had constructed a private bathroom, that he had his own place to take a bath, that he was going to get a towel and clothes and I should stop and see him there and I could get what was on my mind off. He didn’t have time to talk in the cellhouse.
EP: And did you go to his private bathroom?
JD: I went out the dining room tunnel to where he was taking his bath.
EP: Now where was it that he was taking his bath?
JD: It’s a small shower room right next to the space where the officers used to have their dining room, or kitchen, rather.
EP: Is that around the main building here?
JD: No.
EP: Back out in the yard?
JD: It’s not in the yard, it’s just outside of B house. There’s a circular tunnel going around the dining room. It’s just away from the B house tunnel.
EP: Just what happened?
JD: I stopped in the bathroom and I waited for him.
EP: Was the door closed?
JD: It was open.
EP: Did you have any talk to him while he was in the bathroom?
JD: He was still in cellhouse C, he said he’d have to get his clothes so I waited for him.
EP: How long had you been waiting for him before he came?
JD: Just about five minutes, I guess.
EP: When he came, what did you say to him and what did he say to you?
JD: He came in, closed the door and locked it.
EP: Were you in the bathroom with him?
JD: I was standing there just inside the door, I was locked in with him.
EP: How did he lock the door?
JD: He took a key from his pocket and locked it.
EP: After he locked it did he have on his clothes at that time?
JD: Yes.
EP: Then what did he do with the key?
JD: Left it in the door.
EP: Then just what did he say to you?
JD: He said ‘All right, young man, what have you got to say?’ So I half turned against the face bowl they have in there and I started to talk
EP: What did you say to him?
JD: I told him I would like to get our trouble straightened out. He said, ‘Go ahead and talk, it’s not going to do any good as far as my attitude toward you is concerned.’ While this talk was going on he was getting undressed.
EP: What other conversation did you have?
JD: I don’t remember what he said to me or I to him, but I was trying to find out the reason why he kept bothering me and hounding me around and I didn’t get a chance to say very much before he was undressed.
EP: All right?
JD: Well, I don’t care to say any more, there’s certain things I won’t say.
EP: Well, let’s put it that way, did he try-?
JD: Just how it happened-I won’t say anything while she’s [the stenographer] in here.
EP: Did he want you to submit to some unlawful practices?
JD: Immoral practices, yes.
EP: And what did you say to him?
JD: When he finished undressing I was standing in my same position against the face bowl, his back was towards me. He turned around to me and when he did he had a razor in his hand.
EP: All right, what did he say?
JD: I don’t say
EP: What did he do?
JD: He said it, he didn’t do it. He stood there and he said a few things to me that I would submit to it or else fight.
EP: What did you say to him?
JD: I didn’t know what to say, so he told me to get me clothes off. I started thinking there’s only one thing I got to do, is to get my clothes off.
EP: All right, then what happened?
JD: I stepped into the shower, there’s a sill about six inches out I stepped into the shower and turned the water on.
EP: Where was Loeb at that time?
JD: He was standing there watching me, and then Loeb started to step across the shower to the space that was partitioned off where I was at. I was waiting for my chance. He started to step across the sill and I kicked him in the groin
EP: And what became of him?
JD: The hand that was free, I can’t remember which the razor was in, the one that was free reached toward his groin and the other, he sort of stumbled, sort of went down from pain, as he started to bend over he made a slash at me.
EP: What kind of razor was this?
JD: It was a straight razor with a white handle; he had it open.
EP: And did he cut you any place?
JD: No, I just jumped back as he slashed at me; I just had room enough when I jumped against the wall when he slashed, he was still falling. When his head was about even with my face I hit him in the back with my fist. The hand the razor was in, he made a downward slice at me. The hand went down to grab onto the sill to keep from falling. That’s when I hit him. When I hit him he lost control of the razor. The razor dropped, it was open.
EP: And what did you do?
JD: I jumped completely over his body, the way he was crunched, out of the shower space. He grabbed the razor and turned around at me.
EP: Did he say anything to you?
JD: He was looking like a maniac.
EP: Did he say anything to you?
JD: Not that I remember.
EP: Did you say anything to him?
JD: I can’t remember, I don’t think I did.
EP: Then what happened?
JD: We was wrestling there and fighting all over the small space.
EP: Who had the razor when you were wrestling?
JD: I managed to grab hold of his arm and throat and, at the same time, our feet were wet and it was slippery, he dropped the razor and recovered it again. He dropped it again. He was on the bottom and I was on the bottom.
EP: Did you make any outcry while he was struggling?
JD: All I could do was hold my own.
EP: Did you make any outcry for help?
JD: No
EP: Did he make any outcry for help?
JD: No. I fell. I grabbed his throat and his wrist. I fell backward over the sill and he fell on top of me and lost control of the razor again.
EP: Did he cut you at all?
JD: No.
EP: How was that?
JD: I don’t know, I was lucky.
EP: After he got control of the razor again?
JD: Well, I got control of the razor this time.
EP: What did you do?
JD: I started slashing at him.
EP: If you remember, where did you slash him first?
JD: I don’t know. I think somewhere on the body.
EP: When you slashed him, did he make an outcry?
JD: I think he swore.
EP: Where was he when you slashed him the first time?
JD: On his feet grabbing for me.
EP: And how many times did you slash him?
JD: I don’t know. I fell and lost the razor and he got it right after. I slashed him. I don’t know how many times. He was on top of me again, he had hold of my throat. I fell across the sill again. He was kneeling over me.
EP: Did he say anything to you?
JD: Not a word.
EP: Was he bleeding?
JD: I had blood all over me. He had blood all over his body. I don’t know just where he was cut.
EP: Then what happened?
JD: Why he just-it flashed in my mind I either died right there or got out of it some way.
EP: About how many times would you say that you slashed him?
JD: I don’t know, I can’t remember. Not over three, if I did that much. That’s just as roughly as I can guess at it.
EP: Was he on his feet all the time that you slashed him?
JD: That I can’t remember.
EP: Supposing that I told you that he had at least forty slashes on him, across his abdomen, on his hips, on his head, on his hands, on the front of his throat, on the back of his throat?
JD: That don’t make me a liar, does it?
EP: I mean would that refresh your memory?
JD: We fought for almost a half an hour in there.
EP: Was he on the floor at any time?
JD: Yes, he was on the floor.
EP: Did you slash him on the floor?
JD: No, while he was on his knees, though.
EP: Did he say anything while you was slashing him?
JD: Yes, he did talk. I remember he said a lot of things. All I could think about was saving Jimmy.
EP: Well did he have any weapon besides the razor?
JD: Not that I could see.
EP: Did you have any weapon besides the razor?
JD: No. I didn’t have the weapon, he had the razor. While the fight was going on, I had it, but I didn’t own it.
Day said an inmate in the prison detention hospital examined him after the fight and found no marks or cuts on his body. No doctor, he said, made such an examination at that time.
EP: Well, just when did you quit cutting him?
JD: I quit cutting him when he was laying on the floor, he was laying there. He got up again after I stepped out of the shower.
EP: Did he say anything to you?
JD: I can’t remember that he did.
EP: Well, did you leave the bathroom?
JD: No, he left the bathroom first, staggered as you may say.
EP: And what did you do?
JD: The story is all jumbled up. I could tell it better without the questions asked.
EP: Just go ahead and tell us from where we left off.
JD: From the time that I first slashed him, I slashed him I don’t know how many times. We wrestled. There was some more wrestling. I slashed him again. I lost the razor once and when I got it again he came at me with his outstretched hands. That’s what he was doing during the whole fight, and I just kept slashing and slashing. He finally fell in the hot water. The hot water was on. If I was telling it as I should have told it I would have said that he turned on the hot water to form a smoke screen for battle. When he was lying on the floor, when he finally fell he laid pretty still. I turned the hot water off, almost off, and then I turned the cold water on.
He laid there and didn’t make any move to open his eyes or anything, so I stepped underneath the water. My body was red all over. I let the water wash me over pretty well and I stepped out of the shower space where the clothes were. He was still laying there with cold water running on him. I reached for the towel and I was afraid to put the razor down to use both hands, so I tried to wipe myself to get out. I did a pretty good job of it when I heard him laugh, or moan or something. I turned around and he was on his feet lunging on me again, his hands stretched out. I was afraid to use my fist, to get caught in the what-you-call, in a death grasp or something. I slashed at him some more and he fell back again. I hit plenty times. I just kept slashing and slashing. He fell down again. I washed the blood off of me, stepped out again, started to dry myself and I dried myself as much as I cared to. Of course I was in a hurry to get out there and I heard him again.
EP: Did you hear him say anything?
JD: Mumbling or something. I can’t tell you what it was. I turned around to face the shower and he was on his feet and, just as I faced him, he lunged at me and I fell, fell on my back. He jumped over me, reached the door and I got to my feet and seen that he didn’t want to bother me anymore, but was trying to get out. I stood there and let him open the door and he went out, right naked as he was.
EP: Did he shut the door?
JD: No, he ran out into the main tunnel around the dining room. That’s the last I seen of him.
EP: All right, what did you do?
JD: I stood there after he was gone. I reached for a shirt. First thing came to my side happened to be his shirt. It was hanging on a nail. I put the shirt around me and stepped out to the corridor myself. There was excitement, a lot of the inmates getting out of the way, and I yelled at one of them, I don’t know who he was, and I says: ‘Go get a captain.’ The captain’s office is about fifty feet from there, I guess. He got a captain in fact there was about eight come at one time. I remember handing the razor to Capt. Humphrey and after that, why, I don’t know what it was, I was brought to the hospital.
Day said he was then taken to the main prison hospital, then the detention hospital. Powers asked if he’d had previous trouble with Loeb.
D: Yes. I had trouble with him since a month from when I was transferred from Pontiac.
He was asked what the trouble was.
D: I’m tired of talking. The whole story has been taken down. I just finished fifteen minutes before I came here.
He was pressed to talk more.
D: There’s nothing I wish to keep secret. The whole story, just as it happened from the first I laid eyes on him up until today is only one story. I spent two hours giving it.
He said his previous account was taken by a stenographer. He said he saw no keeper outside the bathroom when Loeb entered.
P: You said something about him hounding you around. Just what was that?
D: I’d have to tell the whole story. The reason he’s been after me, you have the reason already, and of course the way he did it is all detail.
P: Did he write you notes or want to meet you?
D: Every time he met me alone any place he’d stop me and reopen the subject.
P: You said something about this being his private bath, what do you mean by that?
D: All I know is that that’s where he took his bath.
P: Did anybody else use that bath?
D: As I understand it, it was for the correspondence school and the library. Pentosky was in the bakery all day.
P: Do you know where this razor came from?
D: I have no idea.
P: Did you ever see this razor before?
D: No, it looked like a dozen of others to me.
P: Did he tell you where he got it?
D: No, of course not.
P: At any time did he threaten to kill you?
D: No
P: Never used any words?
D: No words to that effect.
P: Do you care to look at him?
D: No, no, I don’t want to look at him!
P: Well, I’d like to have you look at him.
D: It’s bad enough as is. I’ve said all I have to say, everything has been taken down. What you’ve got down here are just parts of the whole story.
P: Nobody ever communicated any threats to you that he had said he was going to kill you or do you bodily harm?
D: No.
P: Did you ever complain to any of the officers about what you said, that he was always hounding you around?
D: No.
P: And why didn’t you?
D: Because I’ve been in jail for four years now and from the very first day I came in I have minded my own business. I have never been interested in what other people did, as long as they let me alone. I’ve got a reputation of being a good guy, never a stool pigeon on anybody, and I thought that I could straighten this matter out without going to get myself a reputation as a stool pigeon.
P: Well, doesn’t it seem funny to you that you didn’t have any marks and any cuts on you?
D: Doesn’t it seem funny to me?
P: Yes. All this struggling, the wrestling and fighting and everything?
D: I can’t help that, the mental doctor in charge examined me and put every bruise and everything down in the paper. He had me stripped off.
This concluded the regular statement, followed by additional statement taken a few minutes later. He was asked if his statement was the truth.
D: You’ve got pieces of it, that’s the truth.
He said nothing that he said was untrue, no promises or threats had been made to him and that he knew the statement might be used against him at the trial. He was asked if his answers would be the same were he questioned again.
D: Ha, undoubtedly.
He was shown the razor he used and Day refused to admit it was the identical weapon he gave to Humphrey, or even that it was similar, except that the handle was white.
P: When you was slashing and cutting Loeb, were you angry?
D: I don’t know.
P: You say you don’t know?
D: No, I don’t. I don’t know how I was feeling. There was only one thing I was thinking about, that was saving my life, I guess.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 2, 1936)
There was an argument about if the statement should be read.
WH: The second statement we believe to be a true narration of what actually occurred in the shower room. We feel we can convict him on it.
EB: That statement was obtained by bull-dog tactics and as such it is not admissible.
The State rested at 2:15 pm shortly after statement introduced.
(CEA, June 2, 1936)
Florence Zelko, the stenographer, verified the confession document.
General
(Chicago Daily Times, June 2, 1936)
The Judge denied a motion to direct the jury to a verdict of not guilty.
(CDN, June 2, 1936)
Before calling witnesses the defense lawyers moved for a directed verdict of not guilty. This was denied.
Levy and Byrne called 5 unpleasant looking convicts to the stand: George Bliss, Robert Camy, Richard Dittman, James Corcoran and Victor Walinsky.
(CT, June 3, 1936)
5 cons testified, 2 that Loeb made improper advances on them, offering money and “anything you want in the prison.” A former cellmate said he got a “cinch job” in the correspondence school and lost it 3 weeks later when he was transferred from Loeb’s cell. 2 said they saw razor in Loeb’s possession.
Doctors, General
(CEA, June 2, 1936)
The doctors testified earlier in the morning than the defense witnesses.
Prison doctors testified about how they patched Loeb up in revolting detail so he would make a passable corpse. All agreed he died of shock and loss of blood. On cross-examination they admitted that the assistant state’s attorneys got them a hotel room (210 of Woodruff Hotel) for a ‘party’ where they admitted they discussed the testimony they would give.
Kingston gave the room number and admitted that Edward Powers was chief host, adding that “testimony to be given at the Day trial was discussed.”
Dr. Sehring said he attended the party and was asked by Byrne as he left the stand: “By the way, doctor, who picked up the check and paid it?” The question went unanswered, though men in shirtsleeves in crowd laughed. There were few women present.
Those who testified were Dr. E A Kingston (Will County coroner), Dr. Londus Brannon Jr. (prison doctor), Dr. Robert W Lennon (prison doctor), Dr. George Sehring (doctor from Joliet), Dr. George H Woodruff (doctor from Joliet) and Dr. Arthur I Shreffter (doctor from Joliet).
Richard Dittman
(Chicago Daily Times, June 3, 1936)
He was the first defense witness. He told of Loeb’s influence and how he wooed but was unable to win a number of inmates. Women in the crowd blushed.
Richard Dittman was 26, serving 1-Life for robbery, and said that Loeb solicited him for sex 3 times. Once Loeb called him to the office of the correspondence school and threatened Dittman with a razor if he wouldn’t submit.
RD: I told him he was crazy if he thought he could get away with that sort of thing and Loeb replied, ‘Well if you feel that way about it, forget it.’
Dittman said while Loeb was trying to solicit him, Loeb sent pies, cakes and cigarets to his cell.
RD: I returned everything he sent me and when he told me I could have a lot of spending money if I would go along with him I said not even if he laid $100 on the table.
(JEHN, June 3, 1936)
Richard Dittman calmly announced that Loeb had threatened him with a razor identical to that used by Day.
RD: In the latter part of April or the first of May in 1934 Loeb called me to him for the third time in a few weeks. ‘I’m going to lay the cards on the table.’ He said. ‘Go along with me and you can have anything you want.’ I told him that I wouldn’t go for such a thing. He said you can at least try it. When I refused he pulled out a razor and threatened me.
He identified the razor that killed Loeb as similar to the one Loeb had threatened him with.
(CEA, June 2, 1936)
Richard Dittman said Loeb threatened him with a razor in 1934 when he resisted his advances.
RD: Loeb called me into the prison library and tried to interest me in a lot of books. I went several times. Finally he said: ‘I will throw my cards on the table. You don’t have to be frightened about anything. I’ll take care of the details.’ I knew what he meant and I got plenty angry. I resented his approaches and he drew a razor and threatened me. I just grinned and said ‘You can’t frighten me, my friend, with any tricks like that.’
Loeb then suddenly calmed down apologized, saying to Dittman: “Oh boy, don’t bother.”
(CT, June 3, 1936)
Dittman has been in the penitentiary since 1933 for robbery in Chicago. He’s a slight, blond young man with a mottled complexion.
RD: I saw Loeb with a razor in the latter part of 1934. He made propositions to me on three different occasions that year. Once he called me into the prison library and asked me if I would go along with him. I refused. Shortly afterward he invited me to the prison correspondence school, which he ran. He said, ‘I’ll lay my cards on the table. I’ve got a lot of time to serve and you and me can be good buddies.’ I told him I didn’t go in for that sort of thing. He pulled out a razor. I said: ‘If you think you can pull that stuff, you’re crazy.’ Then he told me if I felt that way about it he would forget it. But he started sending me cigarets, pies and cakes, and renewed his importunities.
On another occasion he gave me a lecture on psychology and history, telling me great men had frequently done what he was asking me to do. He said I could have all the pocket money I wanted if I would just listen to reason. I told him: ‘Even if you lay $100 on the table, I wouldn’t listen.’
He also testified that Loeb didn’t wear prison garb, but dressed nattily on all occasions and appeared to roam the prison at will. On cross-examination by Herschbach and McKeown, his story remained unshaken.
(CHE, June 3, 1936)
Richard Dittman, a Chicago robber, was the first defense witness.
RD: It was in April or May of 1934 that Loeb asked me to go along with him. He said, ‘I’ll lay my cards on the table. You have a lot of time to do here and if you’ll go along you’ll find it easier.’ I refused. Twice after that he summoned me to his office and on the third time I got mad and was ready to fight. Loeb reached into his pocket, and drew out a white handled, straight edged razor.
Dittman was shown the razor used to kill Loeb.
RD: It looks exactly like the one Loeb used to threaten me.
Victor Walinski
[Though the papers report him as being 50 years old, he killed a policeman in 1927 when he was 18, so he’d be around 27 during this testimony.]
(JEHN, June 3, 1936)
Victor Walinski identified the death razor as Loeb’s and said he shaved with it while he was Loeb’s cell mate for three weeks in 1932. He said he got a job as school instructor the same day he moved into Loeb’s cell and that he lost the job when he left the cell three weeks later.
VW: Loeb got me the job and Loeb got me fired.
HL: What did you do as instructor in the parole school?
VW: Nothing.
When he was asked why he was requested to leave Loeb’s cell this was objected to and sustained.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 3, 1936)
Victor Walinski, a 50 year old lifer, told of sharing a cell with Loeb for 3 weeks.
VW: That was all I was with him and then I asked to be transferred to another cell.
He was unable to tell jury why he asked for a transfer; the State objection to it was sustained. He said he was transferred to Loeb’s cell at Loeb’s request and given a job as an instructor in SCS. He did “nothing at all” in his job and “Loeb got me the job and got me fired.” He identified the razor used by Day as Loeb’s. “I know it by a nick in the blade. I shaved with it many times and so did Loeb.”
(CT, June 3, 1936)
Walinski is a 50 year old who has been in prison for 8 years, serving a life term for murder in Rockford.
VW: In 1932 Loeb had me transferred from cell block F to his cell in block C. He promised to get me a job in the prison parole school, and he did.
HL: What did you do in that job?
VW: Nothing at all. After three weeks I asked to be transferred from Loeb’s cell.
HL: Were the birds bothering you?
The State objected, Walinski was not allowed to answer.
HL: Were you transferred?
VW: I was and the same day I was fired from my job in the parole school.
Levy showed him the razor.
HL: Have you ever seen this razor before?
VW: Yes. I recognize it by a nick on the handle as the same one Loeb used to shave with.
(CEA, June 2, 1936)
Shaven headed Victor Wolinsky testified that Loeb got him a job in the school in January of 1932. He moved in in the morning, then moved out in the evening and lost the job.
George Bliss
(Chicago Daily Times, June 2, 1936)
GB: Day told me that Loeb-that Loeb had tried to make him (faltering)
Bliss said he met Loeb a few days before the slaying and told him to “lay off Jimmy-he’s a decent kid.” He said Loeb replied: “I won’t talk to you, for this is a personal matter between Day and me-we’ll settle it ourselves.”
(JEHN, June 3, 1936)
George Bliss did damage to the State when he told of a conversation he and Loeb had after he had attempted to straighten out their personal difficulties.
(CT, June 3, 1936)
Bliss told of Loeb coming to Day’s cell January 24th and seeking to fight Day.
(CEA, June 2, 1936)
George Bliss was an outspoken defense witness. He said he warned Loeb to stay away from Day because Day had complained to him of Loeb’s unwelcome attention. He told of a conversation he had with Loeb in the prison chapel 4 days before the fight when Loeb said he wanted to “have a few words” with Day and was told Day was too small to fight him.
On cross-examination Bliss said: “I had no use whatever for Dickie Loeb on account of his reputation.” Questions about his reputation were objected to and sustained.
Robert Camy
(CEA, June 2, 1936)
Robert Camy, a cellmate of James Day’s and a murderer, was another strong character witness for Day. Camy said Loeb showed a more than friendly interest in him.
James Corcoran
(CEA, June 2, 1936)
James Corcoran who works in the chaplain’s office, said with a grin after telling of a meeting between Loeb and Day: “Sure I was Loeb’s cellmate-but not for long!”
June 3rd
James Day
(CT, June 4, 1936)
The small courtroom was jammed to overflowing, crowds thronged the corridors outside, many of them women. They hid their faces in embarrassment at Day’s testimony, blushed, giggled, but all leaned forward to hear every word.
Day was short, stocky, pimply faced. He wore the same gray suit that he’s worn since trial began. His tie is in a gay checked pattern. He gave most of his testimony calmly, but as he described the battle it tumbled out in rush of excitement.
He said in August he would be 22. He previously gave his age as 23.
JD: I met Loeb the first week of September, 1934. I wanted to take a course in English in the prison correspondence school which he ran. I had no money, but he said it wouldn’t cost me anything.
JD: He had me transferred from B cell block to the C block, where his cell was. He offered to get me an easy job. I said I had no money, no way to repay him, my folks were poor. He said that didn’t matter. He sent cigarets to my cell.
Six months later, I met him in the prison library. He said: ‘You seem to be a very bright boy. I’ve been here eleven years and expect to be here all my life. I want to ask a favor.’
He then gave me a talk on prison immorality and asked me to be broad minded. He drew anatomical charts and told me what he was asking was art. He said he was a graduate of the University of Chicago and knew the medical end of the matter. I turned him down angrily and left.
Early last January he told me: ‘I hope you see my way about it. They’re tightening up around here and they’ve tightened on me. I can’t give you the cigarets and things I used to.’ I turned him down again.
HL: Now in January, were you nervous?
JD: Yes. I had been for several months because he hounded me.
HL: Did he say what rumor he would spread in the prison if you didn’t go along with him?
JD: Yes, he said he would tell the others I was a punk, nobody would associate with me, I would be kicked around.
JD: Loeb had told me he was going to get me a job and a transfer. On the morning of January 28th I went to Loeb’s cell where he was breakfasting with his partner in the murder of Bobby Franks.
Day asked Loeb to talk, Loeb made an appointment at noon in the shower room. Day told of meeting Loeb there. Loeb locking the door, them both taking off their clothes and Loeb saying he wanted to “straighten things out.” He described Loeb’s proposal and the appearance of the razor. Then the battle, in which he got possession of the razor and slashed Loeb “to save my own life.”
JD: Loeb was like a maniac in there. His eyes were big as dollars, his hands were like claws. The hot water from the shower burned me, blood was all over me. When he first propositioned me in the bathroom he said: ‘After all, it’s not like having your right arm cut off.’ But I wouldn’t stand for it, I fought for my life. He knocked me down and I knocked him down. Finally he staggered out of the bathroom. That’s the last I saw of him.
HL: Why did you slash him?
JD: I had to or I’d have been killed
HL: Did you know how badly you cut Loeb?
JD: No. His body was blurred before my eyes. The world was spinning around.
HL: Why did you slash him?
JD: I had to or I’d have been killed.
(CDN, June 3, 1936)
Day told how he liquidated a difficult moral situation by slashing Loeb to shreds, saying it was “either Loeb or Jimmy.” He was stocky and pimply faced.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 3, 1936)
Day was a pimply-faced orphan with a monotone, even voice.
JD: Dickie Loeb said he was a wolf…His eyes were as big as dollars…When he came at me, I slashed…and slashed…and slashed.
JD: He told me that his feeling for me had become more than friendship and he asked me to be broadminded. He said it was the custom in the prison and that if I would submit he would get me a lot of privileges.
HL: When did you first meet Dickie Loeb?
JD: The first week of September in 1934. I wanted to improve my English and I was told by other inmates that Loeb ran a correspondence school in the prison. I went to him. We talked about the course half an hour and although the instruction usually cost money, he said it would cost me nothing.
Levy asked Day to describe the events which led to stabbing.
JD: About two days after out talk I saw him again in his office. Loeb told me he was a wolf and that he could do a lot of things for me. He said he could get me a job in the prison. I said there was no way in which I could repay any favors, but he told me there would be no obligations. Then sometime later I was transferred from cellhouse B to cellhouse C and I was made a typist in the office of the business manager of the jail. He sent me cigarets every now and then.
About six months later, I met Loeb in the library, of which Nathan Leopold was in charge. I selected a book and Loeb came and sat on a radiator next to me. He told me he had something important to tell me. I was very bright, he said, and added that he had been in jail for 11 years and expected to be in the rest of his life. He said he wanted to talk to me about sex in jail. ‘Something more than friendship has grown between us’ he told me. ‘In ancient days what I am asking of you was an art.’
Then Day said Loeb drew diagrams and anatomical charts showing how it was to be done.
JD: ‘I graduated from the University of Chicago,’ he went on, ‘and I know the medical end of this. There will be no bad results.’
He dramatically turned to the jury
JD: In plain words, gentlemen, he told me he wanted to [censored]
Spectators turned crimson and several women left.
D: I tried to get up and leave. I was pretty mad. Loeb begged me not to leave-to think it over. While he was propositioning me he placed his head in my lap and told me I would have as much fun as he would. Then he said he would intervene for me before the parole board and get me a job with Professor Laune, prison sociologist. Loeb had a pass-a card-that enabled him to go about the pen at will. That was later taken when Warden Ragen came.
A few days later, I returned to the library and met Loeb there again. He asked me if I had changed my mind. ‘What I want to do is the custom here,’ he explained. After that I saw him about twice a month and he kept telling me I knew where my job came from and he could take it away.
He said Loeb told him: ‘Ragen was tightening up on the joint and you too. I hope you see my way about things.’ Day said he had a personal grudge fight with an inmate 3 days prior to stabbing, which was how he blackened his eye. Loeb kept hounding him until Austin Corcoran intervened. Bliss and Camy- Day’s cellmates-approached Loeb and asked what the trouble was. Loeb said:
JD: ‘It is a personal matter between us and we must settle is personally.
The Judge called recess, but no spectator left their seats, they were afraid to lose them. The corridors were jammed with others waiting to get in.
JD: Loeb’s hounding of me had made me nervous and hysterical. He told me that he would spread the rumor that I was a punk if I didn’t go along with him.
The morning of the stabbing Day stopped by Loeb’s cell, 129, to “straighten the matter out.” Loeb said he was “going to take a bath in my private shower room” and to “drop in there and see me.” Leopold was there but took no part in the conversation.
JD: I went to the shower room and found the door unlocked. A few minutes later Loeb came in and told me whatever I had to say wouldn’t do any good. I wanted to talk it over and smooth things. Loeb disrobed and suddenly turned around with an open razor in his hand. He ordered me to take off my clothes. Thinking I would kill time, I did. Then Loeb came toward me, his eyes as big as dollars. I kicked him in the groin and he fell. As he fell he dropped the razor and I grabbed it.
Then as he approached me with that look in his eyes I started slashing. I slashed and slashed and slashed. Then he fell and I took a shower to wash his blood from my body.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 4, 1936)
Day quoted Loeb as saying:
JD: ‘I’m a wolf. You’ll get hep to that a little later.’ He told me his feeling for me had become more than friendship and he asked me to be broadminded.
(CDN, June 3, 1936)
Day was a confident witness, who showed none of the hysteria he did the afternoon after the killing. He comes from West Virginia hillbilly stock, a society whose moral code might condone larceny and murder, but never degeneracy.
Questioned by Levy, Day directly addressed the jury. “This is not very nice, gentlemen,” then said some lewd prison jargon. He said he was born in Lynchburg, his father died 3 months before his birth, his mother died when he was 6, and he was sent to live with his grandmother in Chicago. On Feb 19, 1932 he was sent to Pontiac where he learned the blacksmith trade and commercial work. He moved to Stateville in 1934. For the first 4 months he lived in cellhouse B.
HL: When did you first become acquainted with Richard Loeb?
JD: In December, 1934.
HL: How did you happen to meet him?
JD: I asked my cell partner how I could go about completing my education, and he told me to see Loeb, that he was in charge of the correspondence school.
HL: And did you see Loeb?
JD: Yes, I asked him about a course in English composition, and he said he’d be glad to help me.
HL: How long did you remain in B house after meeting Loeb?
JD: About four months
HL: Before you were transferred to C house did you have a conversation with Loeb relative to the transfer?
JD: Yes, Loeb had told me he was going to get me a job and a transfer. I told him I didn’t want to be under any obligation, though, that I couldn’t return his favors.
He was put into work in the business office 10 minutes after he was transferred to C House. Then Loeb began his overtures. Loeb accompanied Day to the library about twice a week, then last June:
JD: I was sitting in a chair and Loeb, who had been working on the filing cabinets, came and sat down on a radiator near me. He said he had something important to say to me, and that it would take some time to say it. He told me he would be in prison the rest of his life and that he wanted me to take a broad-minded view of what he was saying
Loeb then went into a historical discussion of degeneracy complete with an anatomical diagram, and explanations of the ancient Greece baths and Rome.
JD: “To make a long story short, I’m a wolf.”
Day said he rejected the proposal once he understood it. Loeb fell to his knees and begged Day “not to fly off the handle like that.” Day said he pushed Loeb’s face and fled the library.
JD: I’m telling you about as good as I can remember.
HL: When did you next see Loeb?
JD: A couple of days later. He brought my cap in my cell. I had left it in the library. He asked me if I had slept over his proposition and changed my mind.
Day said he hadn’t, and after that Loeb started his harassment, reminding Day that Loeb gave him his job and he could take it away. 3 days before the killing there was almost violence between them. Loeb took his coat off to fight Day in the Catholic chaplain’s office. Bliss intervened. Day said he met Loeb the morning of killing and asked if he could see him sometime that day.
JD: After dinner Loeb came to my cell and told me I could see him in his bathroom in a little while.
Day waited for him for 5 minutes, then Loeb came in and locked the door. Day then repeated his story-no discrepancies. As Loeb was undressing:
JD: I said ‘Listen, Dick,-I called him by his first name-‘I don’t want any trouble with you or any fight. I’m trying to get a parole, and I don’t want anything against my record. Let’s straighten this out.’
JD: [quoting Loeb] “no need of all this trouble, after all, you’re not getting your arm cut off.”
JD: It was steamy in that room-the walls were going around.
JD: All I could see was a man sometimes, a pair of eyes, and hands reaching at me like claws.
HL: Why did you slash Loeb?
JD: I had to do that, or else get killed.
HL: At the time Loeb had the razor in his hand did you believe that a criminal assault was to be made upon you?
JD: All I thought of was Bobby Franks-
This was objected to and sustained.
D: Yes.
(CHE, June 4, 1936)
Day said Loeb’s wealth made him the master of other cons, and those who “went along with him” got easy berths. Asked why he didn’t report Loeb, Day said: “I never had the reputation of being a stoolpigeon.”
JD: “All I thought of was Bobby Franks-“
This was objected to and sustained.
HL: Why did you slash him?
JD: I had to, or I’d have been killed.
(JEHN, June 4, 1936)
Day was a great witness. Quoting Loeb: “I’m a wolf. You’ll get hep to that a little later.” “He told me that his feelings for me had become more than friendship and he asked me to be open minded.”
(CEA, June 3, 1936)
James Day took the stand and told substantially the same story as the confession yesterday. Day was calm except for a few moments during cross-examination. He spoke slowly, was small, wiry, with a mottled complexion. He wore a prison made, baggy suit with a new grey shirt and polka dot tie.
JD: This fellow [Loeb] had the run of the prison. Anything he wanted to do he did.
JD: He took me over to the prison library, conducted by Nathan Leopold Jr.
Day went on a little incoherently about several meetings in the library until he came to the point.
JD: Dickie told me he wanted to show me the books I should read. But he didn’t What he said was that he had been in the prison eleven years and added: ‘I am a wolf. You’ll get hep to that a little later.’
Day then told of an unprintable conversation with Loeb. Under questioning from Levy and Byrne he said this had been going on since he arrived from Pontiac. Quoting Loeb he said:
JD: I will not only get you cigarets every day, but I’ll also provide you with pocket money. I’ll also have you transferred to the warden’s office or some soft office job like that.
“I got that black eye, not in a brawl, as so many people have said, but in a regularly staged boxing bout. I and the other fellow both had gloves on. I’m not quarrelsome and I don’t ordinarily get into fights.”
“Loeb first wanted me to take a correspondence course. I thought it was a good idea, but I told him I had no money. He said it was costly, but that I wouldn’t have to pay. He’d take care of that. I was fish enough to fall for that line. Why, he got me a job one day and 10 minutes later he had me transferred to a cell two doors away from him, up in Cellhouse C, where anything can happen.”
Day’s Cross-Examination
(CDN, June 3, 1936)
WH: Weren’t you transferred from Pontiac with a certain reputation?
JD: I certainly was not.
WH: Do you know an inmate of Stateville named Ray Williamson?
Day said yes
WH: Isn’t it a fact that Loeb’s attention to Williamson had made you jealous?
JD: No
(CT, June 4, 1936)
WH: You took cigarets from Loeb?
JD: Yes
WH: Did you pay him back?
D: I couldn’t
H: In a conversation with convict James Kelly didn’t you once say that what you were getting from Loeb wasn’t for nothing?
D: No
H: Didn’t George Bliss tell you early last January that Loeb told him he was going to leave you alone for 30 days and not talk to you?
D: No
H: Isn’t it a fact that Loeb’s attentions in another convict made you jealous?
D: No
Herschenbach showed Day photos of Loeb’s body.
WH: Did you inflict all these wounds?
JD: I guess I’d say I did.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 3, 1936)
Day said he was under tension for 4-5 months preceding the battle.
WH: Were you very close to Loeb just before the shower room incident?
JD: No, my friendship with him terminated in June, 1935.
WH: And that was because you were trying to borrow from him, wasn’t it?
JD: No, sir.
Day admitted he had been treated during that time in the prison hospital.
WH: And wasn’t that because of immoral practices you conducted with yourself?
JD: No.
Day denied he’d taken a second shower to wash off Loeb’s blood.
WH: Didn’t Bliss tell you Loeb was going to leave you alone for 30 days after he had intervened for you a month prior to the quarrel?
JD: No, he did not.
(CEA, June 3, 1936)
WH: Were you very close to Loeb just before the shower room incident?
JD: No. My friendship terminated in June, 1935.
WH: And that was because you were trying to borrow from him-wasn’t it?
Day stood up
JD: That is not true
(CHE June 4, 1936)
He admitted that he received presents from Loeb but denied he was jealous because Loeb transferred his attentions to another prisoner.
(CEA, June 3, 1936)
Day was asked if Loeb’s attentions to other inmates made Day jealous, he said no.
WH: Did you ever offer a prayer over Loeb’s body as it lay in the prison morgue?
JD: No
He denied he had any trouble because of borrowing. Asked why he didn’t tell anyone about Loeb’s advances he said:
D: I never had a reputation of being a stool pigeon.
(CDN, June 3, 1936)
Day said he didn’t report Loeb’s action because he “never had a reputation as a stoolpigeon.”
James Day Redirect Examination
(CT, June 4, 1936)
HL: Now besides the time in the bathroom, were you ever in the nude for Loeb?
JD: No
HL: Why didn’t you tell the prison officials that Loeb was hounding you?
JD: I didn’t want to get a reputation for being a stool pigeon.
HL: Did you ever discuss with any one a plan to kill Loeb?
JD: Never
Rebuttal Witnesses
(CEA, June 3, 1936)
The Defense rested at 1:53 and the State called James Kelly, a convict, to the stand then there was a 20 minute recess.
Asst. Warden Robinson testified to the difference in Loeb’s height and weight compared to Day, who has a small stature.
Carl Muller, the last witness, had nothing good to say about Day. Said Day had told him “I like Loeb, he’s a good guy, but why not? He brings me cigarets and lots of things.” But added “But Jimmy Day kept borrowing from Loeb to the point where he actually made Loeb very angry.”
Muller used to be Day’s cellmate and had him removed. “We had many arguments, mainly because Jimmy wanted to bet all the time on the races.” He said betting prevalent in prison, mostly on baseball with cigarets, but cons will bet on anything. “The main cause of friction between Day and me was that we had different interests. That was because of the wide difference in our ages.” Muller is almost 50, Day 21.
Closing Arguments
Charles McKeown
(Chicago Daily Times, June 4, 1936)
CM: Why gentlemen, the defendant went to the bathroom to meet Loeb of his own free will and volition. Had he known Loeb to have unnatural desires, it is reasonable to believe he never would have gone there.
He calls Day the aggressor.
CM: He kept slashing Loeb even though he admits Loeb was unconscious at one time. Any cloak of innocence that the law may throw around Day has been converted into a shroud. If he is freed other convicts will think they can do the same thing.
He said any friendship between Day and Loeb was because of Loeb’s personality and ability to make friends.
CM: The defense may try to bring back the ghost of Bobby Franks to this courtroom, but if Day goes free that ghost will not comfort you nor your families. We don’t want anybody like Day walking the streets a free man.
(CT, June 4, 1936)
CM: According to Day’s own testimony the razor changed hands several times during the terrific combat. It is impossible for any one to accept Day’s story that he took the razor from Loeb without receiving a scratch. Day knew what Loeb wanted in the bathroom, yet Day was willing to go there to be with Loeb. It is reasonable to assume that Day was the aggressor.
He kept slashing Loeb even though he admits Loeb was unconscious at one time. Any cloak of innocence that the law may throw about Day has been converted into a shroud. If he is freed other convicts will think they can do the same thing.
Day offers a defense that Loeb was a degenerate. We know that from the Franks case. The defense may try to bring back the ghost of Bobby Franks to this courtroom but if Day goes free that ghost will not comfort you jurors nor your families. We don’t want anybody like Day walking the streets a free man. The state asks that your sentence confine him in the penitentiary for the rest of his life.
(CEA, June 3, 1936)
McKeown demanded Day be given a life term (rather than death)
CM: This person should be sent to prison for life for the brutal slaying of Richard Loeb. It doesn’t matter whether Loeb was a credible citizen. The point is that a man was killed.
(CHE June 4, 1936)
CM: If you gentlemen acquit James Day of this murder every convict will feel he has the same right to murder his fellow inmates.
He said it was “reasonable to assume” that Day was the aggressor.
(CDN, June 4, 1936)
McKeown said if the jury voted to acquit it would serve notice to other cons that they could kill and offer the same plea as Day to get off. That they “slew for honor.”
(Chicago Daily Times, June 4, 1936)
McKeown urged a life sentence in closing and they asked that manslaughter to be included in possible verdicts.
June 4
Walter Herschbach
(CEA, June 4, 1936)
The Defense calls him “Little Jimmy Day” the State calls him “Jimmy the Mutilator” and “James the Butcher.”
WH: It’s high time no sympathy was extended to this defendant. His name isn’t Jimmy. It’s James. You might well call him after the pictures you have seen, James the butcher. It is high time that crime lost its cloak of decency. The only issues in this case haven’t been touched by the defense.
He turned dramatically and pointed to small, pimply-faced, defiant Day
WH: “Look at that man! I suppose they want you to believe that there was no strange idea back of those shifty eyes? Well, maybe they can make a jury in Cook County reason that way, but hardly down in Will County. Jimmy the mutilator-that’s what you want to call him? Would you like him for a neighbor?
(CDN, June 4, 1936)
Herschbach pointed and shouted:
WH: Look at this man, Jimmy the butcher, and ask yourselves if there wasn’t a queer friendship between him and Loeb.
WH: There he sits, not Jimmy the underprivileged kid, but a criminal as black as Loeb ever was, with a heart and soul as black as night.
WH: Day’s own story precludes his theory of self-defense. Think of those 57 cuts on Loeb’s body.
(CT, June 5, 1936)
WH: Jimmy the mutilator, Jimmy the butcher.
He said Day might have been receptive to Loeb’s conduct.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 4, 1936)
WH: Defense attorneys call the defendant Jimmy. I call him Jimmy the Mutilator and Jimmy the Butcher. He arranged a meeting with Loeb with murder in his heart.
(CHE, June 5, 1936)
Herschbach said Day had “a heart as black as Loeb’s” but murder must not go unpunished in prison.
Harold Levy
(CDN, June 4, 1936)
Levy declared that if Day was found guilty the jury would be “rebuilding the walls of Sodom and Gomorrah” and serving notice to other cons that they couldn’t protect themselves from a “wolf.” Levy mocked the con witnesses and Sklepkowski in particular: “Nobody who could live with Loeb could be right.”
HL: The state tells you that Day cut Loeb too many times for self defense. Should Day have used a yardstick to measure those cuts as he was defending his body? Under all the laws of God and man he should have killed Loeb.
(JEHN, June 4, 1936)
HL: They have failed in proving that Loeb was at peace with the people and not doing anything that he would have to forfeit his life for. The prosecution went so far as to qualify you jurors for the death penalty. They have abandoned that theory. They are shooting at eagles and hope to get a sparrow.”
He dwelled on the testimony of each witness, especially Sklepkowski.
HL: There isn’t anybody who could have lived in the same cell with Loeb and remained decent. Sklepowski couldn’t and you seen him before you as a moral degenerate who didn’t even want to leave the penitentiary because he is afraid to face his fellow man. Day had the opportunity to have anything inside the gates of the prison but he had the nerve to say no.
They tried to get across the theory of premeditation and failed. Why their own witness, Capt. Austin Humphrey, told you that Day gave him the razor, said this is what I did it with, Cap, and told that officer that Loeb had attempted to assault him. Dickie Loeb, the big shot of cellhouse C, was permitted to run at will from cellhouse to cellhouse on the pretext of giving out education, while the only education he desired to give was one in degeneracy.
Gentleman, I say to you that when Loeb attempted an illegal assault upon the body of this defendant, Jimmy Day had a perfect right to take the life of Loeb without further cause.
(CEA, June 4, 1936)
HL: State’s witnesses, in the main, were inmates of the state prison. Although the state qualified you to administer the death penalty, they have given that up. I told you at the outset they were shooting at eagles and hoping to catch sparrows. They’re fine fellows: it isn’t their fault they haven’t enough ammunition.
He thrust at Loeb’s reputation and each witness, then the surly story told by Sklepkowski.
HL: This young Sklepkowski, as you gentleman saw, testified with venom and hatred for the defendant, Day. Well, can you blame him? He had been at the mercy of a pardon board which wouldn’t do anything for him. And then along came Loeb! Nobody could live with Loeb in a cell and live right. From the time he went into prison in 1924 for the unspeakable murder of Bobby Franks, Dickie was wrong. Now Sklepkowski tries to whitewash the whole works. He knew that Dickie Loeb was running the prison. Yet he says that even the ‘Dickie-birds’ in Loeb’s cell were no particular favor. Humphry himself told you about Loeb’s conduct. Why, Jimmy could have had anything he wanted in prison if he submitted to Loeb as others had done. Unless an example is made of this fellow, Day, anything may happen in Stateville prison.
He tried to say that Ragen and Swolley’s testimony proved that Loeb had never been unconscious in the bathroom because he had walked 75 feet before collapsing. He poked fun at Edward ‘Foxy’ Powers, the investigator.
HL: Well the state had no case so Foxy Powers wound it all up by taking the principals up to Room 210 in the Woodruff Hotel and talking it over. It was soon after that the indictment was returned.
He tried to say McCabe dropped the case when he lost the nomination-but this was ruled out.
HL: You know in your own hearts that Dickie Loeb was running the institution at that time. You know from the evidence that the prison reeks with vice. By the laws of God and man, Jimmy Day SHOULD have killed Dickie Loeb!
(CHE June 5, 1936)
HL: By all the laws of God and man, Dickie Loeb should have been killed long ago. From the time he was sentenced to prison for the unspeakable murder of little Bobby Franks, Dickie was wrong.
Jimmy Day could have anything he wanted in prison, had he submitted to Loeb’s demands, as others had done, but this little fellow had the backbone to withstand these attacks. Despite the favors held out to him by the affluent Loeb, Day wanted no part of Loeb or his code of moral ethics.
(CT, June 5, 1936)
Levy attacked the character of the state’s witnesses and accused McCabe of playing politics in having Day indicted. After indictment he was defeated for renomination in April. He did not take part in defense.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 4, 1936)
Levy claimed Day killing Loeb was “within his rights.”
HL: Try to imagine, gentlemen: Jimmy alone in that bathroom with Loeb, facing that murderer, that kidnaper, that pervert. Loeb had told him he had to submit or fight-and Day chose to fight.
Gentlemen, Jimmy had the duty to fight-to fight with everything he had-and to kill if necessary to protect his body from ravishment of that pervert.
Emmett Byrne
(Chicago Daily Times, June 4, 1936)
EB: When a mad dog approaches you you have a right to kill.
(JEHN, June 6, 1936)
EB: You have a right to take in the background of Loeb when he stood in that bathroom facing Jimmy Day with a razor in his hand. He was a proven murderer, a proven kidnaper, a proven pervert. Loeb had nothing to lose. He was in the penitentiary for life and 99 years. He carried on his courtships in a learned way, leading the objects of his affection on by pretending to help them and then gradually attempting to educate them towards his way of thinking. He even went to the extent of discussing ancient history and drawing anatomical charts and diagrams.
Certainly Sklepowski was bitter against Day. Why he is the widow of Dickie Loeb, and the usual period for bereavement is a year.
(CEA, June 4, 1936)
EB: You gentleman, as jurors, have the right to consider the background of Dickie Loeb-murderer, kidnaper, pervert. The state has made much about the fifty-six slashes given Loeb by Day. Don’t you believe that when a mad dog approaches you have the right to use more force than you would at other times?” “If anybody in that prison really needed something, they went to Loeb. If not Loeb, they saw a fellow named Nate Leopold, who runs the prison library.
Talking about the pictures of Loeb’s body:
EB: The prosecution tried to use the same psychology on you that worked on Loeb when he walked 75 feet and collapsed at the sight of blood. They hoped you would associate the sight of blood with the guilt of the defendant.
He tried unsuccessfully to make a point about the missing McCabe. Turning to Day’s aunt and uncle he said:
EB: All this poor, unfortunate little defendant has to hope for is eventual release from prison and a return to the home of these fine people, his nearest relatives. But what had Loeb to look forward to? Nothing. For his attack on the Franks boy, he was serving 99 years and life. He’d never emerge from prison walls. So how is he spending his time? Why, he uses his smooth, oily and educated style to break down the young inmates as they enter; to win their friendship by giving them soft jobs-and then to take them over to Friend Nate’s library, where they could have a little privacy. Yes, Loeb was smooth and educated-but his lack of religious training showed up in his record much earlier than his entrance at Stateville. He carried on courtship after courtship, always in mannerly fashion, but always to the same perverted end.
(CDN, June 4, 1936)
EB: What should Day have done-conducted a pink tea fight when his life and his body were in danger from this murderer, this kidnaper, this pervert?
(CDN, June 4, 1936)
EB: The state talks much about the theory of their case but does not offer you any evidence to support it. This indictment was returned against Day during a political campaign. Where is Bill McCabe now that he isn’t sitting alongside these bright young men, Herschbach and McKeown, who are trying to make a reputation?
With a biting phrase he mimicked Loeb’s discussion of ancient vices with young, impressionable, uneducated inamtes of Stateville and asked jurors if Day should have conducted a “pink tea fight” during the showdown.
(CT, June 5, 1936)
Byrne assailed the administration of Stateville, saying Leopold and Loeb ran it, corrupting other convicts. He declared Day “had the right and should have killed Loeb.”
(Chicago Daily Times, June 4, 1936)
EB: Loeb was a person of education and culture, but he lacked any religious or moral training.
He said that Loeb carried on “courtship after courtship” in prison “and sought to justify his perversion by references to history.”
EB: Loeb had carried on his education in perversion since he murdered Bobby Franks. He and Nathan Leopold ran the jail, and any inmate who wanted to improve himself by studying had to go to one or the other and come under their influence.
While Day had “wanted to lead a clean and decent life while in the penitentiary.”
EB: He had gone to Loeb and asked him to quit hounding him. Loeb had threatened to spread the rumor that Jimmy was a punk so that he could have him shunned by his fellow convicts as though he had the plague.
As to the testimony of Carl Mueller, Byrne explained “he lied to you as he lied in his bank statements that sent him up.”
Sentence
(CT, June 5, 1936)
The sentence was read at 4:26, exactly an hour after jurors retired. They took 53 minutes then informed Judge’s bailiff Lehom Kelly they had verdict.
They took two ballots, there was one hold out the first time. They said Loeb’s reputation was a factor in their decision.
Joseph Schwab, head juror, read verdict. As he did horns and drums could be heard outside the Greystone courthouse-celebrating will county centennial.
JS: There was no question but that the defense proved Day killed Loeb to protect himself from an attempted felony. He fought for the defense of his honor.
Day remained calm, as he has through trial, then when the sentence was read he beamed and tears came to his eyes. Spectators applauded. The Judge spoke to Day:
EW: When you appear before the parole board I will be more than glad to do anything I can for you.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 4, 1936)
The Judge called Day to the bench:
EW: Young man, I believe the verdict to be a just one. I am remanding you back to the custody of the sheriff, but if you want to appear before the parole board I shall be glad to intervene in your behalf.
(JEHN, June 5, 1936)
The Jury came back in 50 minutes, much faster than expected. When the verdict was read the few spectators who were in the court applauded and Day was hugged by his aunt and uncle. The Judge said:
EW: When you appear before the parole board, I will do anything I can for you.
(Chicago Daily Times, June 5, 1936)
EW: I want to tell you, young man, that I think this is a just and fair verdict and when you come before the parole board I’ll be glad to say what I can for you. You must and shall be returned to society.
(CEA, June 1, 1936)
EW: I want to tell you, young man, that I think this is a just and fair verdict, and when you come before the parole board, as you probably will, I will be glad to be summoned and tell my views as stated. You must and shall be returned to society.
The Lives and Legends of Richard Loeb and Nathan Leopold 