Thursday, June 5th, 1913
Wife of Accused Pen[c]il Factory Superintendent Arraigns Solicitor General Dorsey for What She Terms the Torturing of Witnesses Into Making Desired Affidavits—Says Treatment of Her Negro Cook by Solicitor and Detectives Taxed Patience
DECLARES MR. FRANK'S DEMEANOR HAS ALWAYS BEEN THAT OF AN INNOCENT MAN
Says Many Slanders Have Been Circulated Concerning the Alleged Unhappy Married Life of Herself and Her Husband—"He Could Not Have Been the Good Husband He Has Been to Me if He Were a Criminal," Asserts Mrs. Frank
For the first time since her husband, Leo M. Frank, was arrested more than four weeks ago on suspicion of having murdered Mary Phagan, the pencil factory girl, the accused man's wife on Thursday broke her silence and issued a statement in which she vigorously attacks Solicitor General Hugh M. Dorsey and the city detectives for the methods which she charges they have employed in an effort to gather evidence against Mr. Frank.
Mrs. Frank begins her statement by declaring "the action of the solicitor general in arresting and imprisoning our family cook because she would not voluntarily make a false statement against my innocent husband, brings a limit to patience."
She charges that witnesses are being tortured into furnishing the kind of affidavits desired by the solicitor and the detectives, and states that "it is hard to believe that practices of this nature will be countenanced anywhere in the world, outside of Russia."
Several times in the course of her statement, Mrs. Frank reiterates her full confidence in the innocence of her husband. Referring to Mr. Frank's movements on the day of the murder she says: "My husband was at home for lunch and in the evening at the hours he has stated on the day of the murder. He spent the whole of Saturday evening and night in my company. Neither on Saturday, nor Saturday night, nor on Sunday, nor at any other time did my husband by word or act, or in any other way, demean himself otherwise than as an innocent man."
Mrs. Frank asserts that slanders have been circulated to the effect that the home life or herself and her husband was not a happy one. "I know my husband is innocent. No man could make the good husband that he has been to me and be a criminal," she declares.
As stated above this is Mrs. Frank's first public statement since the arrest of her husband, and it will probably be her last. Under the Georgia laws a woman is not permitted to testify for or against her husband. It was for this reason that Mrs. Frank was not summoned as a witness before the coroner's jury:
STATEMENT IN FULL.
Mrs. Frank's statement, which comes to The Journal in the nature of a communication, follows in full:
"Atlanta, Georgia, June 3, 1913.
"Editor Atlanta Journal, Atlanta, Georgia
