Flemington Fantasy

In Hunterdon County. N. J., 150 members of a jury panel received in last week's mail 150 pamphlets. Bound in brown paper, the cover was entitled:

No. 2310

CRIMINAL

FILE

EXPOSED!

Aviator's Baby

Was Never

Kidnapped Or

Murdered

Possessors of the document were warned not to reveal the booklet's contents "to any newspaper, as all news of this trial has been suppressed by order of court." There followed in strict legal form the record of a case in which one John Doe, tramp, was tried for the "kidnap and murder" of a 20-month-old child named Charles A. Limberg Jr. on the night of March 1, 1932 near Hoaxwell, N. J. Attorney for the defense convinced a jury that the child had wandered out of his house of his own accord, could have died of exposure or could have been mortally mangled by foxes and skunks. When the jury brought in a not guilty verdict, an angry mob took over the county.

At once the prosecutor of Hunterdon County, where Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr. disappeared from his Hopewell home on the night of March 1, 1932, declared that somebody was tampering with prospective jurors before whom Bruno Richard Hauptmann will be tried for Baby Lindbergh's murder at Flemington this week.

Newshawks were not long tracing down the author of the fantastic pamphlet. Indeed, the only nonfictional name in it was hers, as defense counsel. She was Mrs. Mary Belle Spencer, crusading Chicago attorney. Last year gaunt white-haired Mrs. Spencer made news by having Dancer Sally Rand arrested for indecent exposure. Mrs. Spencer has brought up two young daughters on a strictly self-expressionistic plan. Once, when they threw their Christmas tree out a window, their mother recalls that "it was hard not to say anything. But I didn't even turn my head." (TIME, Sept. 10, 1934.)

Although she had apparently made full use of all available official documents in the Lindbergh case in preparing her pamphlet, which was written in 1932, long before Hauptmann was arrested, Mrs. Spencer laughingly told reporters: "The whole thing was a satire, written and dictated by me for my own amusement merely to poke fun at the asininity of our police and court system as a whole. . . . As to the charge of the prosecutor that it was mailed to every one on the jury panel, all I can say is that I never heard of the panel. I didn't even know they had one."

Truculently the Hunterdon prosecutor admitted that he "did not suspect persons interested directly in Hauptmann's defense of adopting underhand methods." but charged that the incident was of a piece with other recent happenings which might yet "land somebody else in a cell along with Hauptmann."

On its side, the defense darkly observed that "the mailing of these pamphlets is a deliberate attempt on the part of someone to create an atmosphere of prejudice against the defendant. . . ." For a while it looked as if the whole panel would have to be discharged as prejudiced. It would take 40 days to draw another. In the chambers of sober old Justice Trenchard, before whom the case was to be tried, prosecution and defense finally agreed that no damage had been done either side.

Meantime, Boatbuilder John H. Curtis and Sheriff John H. Curtiss made their bits of pre-trial news. Shortly after the baby disappeared, Mr. Curtis went up from Norfolk, Va. to tell Col. Lindbergh that he was in touch with the kidnappers. When the child's body was found, Curtis renounced his story, was convicted of obstructing justice. He was just barely kept out of jail by Lawyer W. Lloyd Fisher of Flemington. In the past two years he and Lawyer Fisher have grown to be fast friends. Flabbergasted was Friend Fisher, now an associate in Hauptmann's defense, last week when Friend Curtis switched his story again, announced that he was now ready to testify that Hauptmann was one of the kidnappers with whom he had dealings.

Sheriff Curtiss of Flemington added the last "s" to his name after Boatbuilder Curtis's conviction. For weeks newspapermen have grumbled at the price this official put upon his good nature. Last week Governor Moore strongly rebuked him for accepting "donations" from newshawks at the standard rate of $10 for a downstairs seat or $5 for an upstairs seat at the trial. Sheriff Curtiss righteously protested that the "donations" were to be used for "fixing up" the courthouse for the trial. The Governor took the starch out of this protest by revealing that New Jersey had already appropriated $15,000 to cover all trial expenses, would appropriate more if needed.

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