The Trial of the Century

	
	
   
   
	
 This was Flemington, N.J. in January 1935, when Bruno Richard Hauptmann
 went on trial for kidnapping and killing the 20-month-old first-born son of
 world idol Charles A. Lindbergh. It was an event that author H.L. Mencken 
called “the greatest story since the Resurrection.”Walter Winchell, Damon
Runyon, Boake Carter, Gabriel Heatter, Lowell Thomas, Dorothy Kilgallen,
 Edna Ferber and Adela Rogers St. John were among the print and radio 
celebrities joining the swarm of curiosity-seekers at the 1828 courthouse 
on Main Street. Police estimated 16,000 cars came to Flemingt on the first 
weekend of the trial. When Sheriff John Curtiss opened the courthouse to 
the public one Sunday, 5,000 people, twice the population of Flemington,
 elbowed their way in to view the building. Walter Winchell was the leader of 
the media pack that, well before the trial, had decided Hauptmann was 
guilty. Winchell had friends and tipsters in high places, among them J.
Edgar Hoover. Hoover had done his best to convey the impression that the
 case had been broken by the FBI, working with local law enforcement 
agencies. In reality, New Jersey State Police, commanded by Col. Norman
 Schwarzkopf, spearheaded the investigation, aided by New York police. 
Kidnapping was not yet a federal crime, although it would become so by a 
Congressional act dubbed “the Lindbergh Law.” According to trial testimony
(and pre-trial publicity), Dr. John F. (Jafsie) Condon, an elderly Bronx
 educator, volunteered his help by putting a notice in the Bronx Home News 
seeking contact with the kidnapper. In reply he received notes demanding
$70,000 and claiming that the child was safe. The footed winter pajamas the 
toddler had been wearing the night of March 1 were delivered to Dr. Condon
as proof.On April 2, at a rendezvous in a Bronx cemetery, accompanied by
 Lindbergh, Dr. Condon gave a box of marked bills, U.S. gold certificates, 
to a shadowy figure with a reputedly German accent.Two and a half years of 
frustrating investigations and rumors passed before the first real clues led to the arrest of Hauptmann, a Bronx carpenter who had no regular job
 but who appeared to be living better than most folks did in the depths of
the Depression. In September 1934 some of the marked ransom bills began
 showing up. One had been used to buy gasoline at a service station whose
 owner, thinking it might be a counterfeit, wrote the car's license number
 on the bill.  It was Hauptmann's. Police reported finding a stash of
 Lindbergh ransom money in Hauptmann's garage.On the witness stand, 
Hauptmann denied any involvement in the kidnapping, insisted he made money
 by playing the stock market, and said a fur dealer, Isidor Fisch, had left 
the bills at his house. But in the 32 days of the trial in Flemington in
 January and February 1935, the jury found the Lindbergh money to be one of 
the most compelling pieces of evidence produced by prosecutor David
Wilentz. They also believed seven handwriting experts who said the kidnap 
notes matched Hauptmann's handwriting. Woodwork and forestry experts said
 North Carolina pine from a lumberyard near Hauptmann's home, and a board
cut from his floor, were used in the crudely built kidnapping ladder.
 Hauptmann said no “real carpenter” could produce such rough work. Rounding
 out Wilentz's case were eyewitnesses who placed Hauptmann in the area of 
the Lindbergh estate on the day of the crime. Defense counsel Edward Reilly 
was a flamboyant, hard-drinking attorney from Brooklyn.  He was hired by the
 Hearst newspapers to add some color to the trial, which looked to be an
 open and shut case. Reilly scoffed at the circumstantial evidence against
 Bruno. “There is no such thing as a wood expert,” he asserted. He suggested
 that the true culprits were the Lindbergh's servants, or gangsters, or
 Hauptmann's friend Fisch, or Dr. Condon. He attacked the police as inept 
bunglers who had planted evidence and botched the investigation. In his
 prime, Reilly was known for his unflappable courtroom demeanor and ability 
to convince a jury to disregard the most damning of evidence. Unfortunately 
for Hauptmann, Reilly was on the downside of his career, suffering not only 
from alcoholism, but also syphilis. Post trial jury comments described
 Reilly as an arrogant dandy who did little to help Hauptmann's 
cause. Prosecutor Wilentz in his five-hour summation urged the jurors not to 
bring a wishy-washy recommendation of mercy. Their choice, he said, was to 
acquit “this animal, this Public Enemy Number One of the World” or find him guilty of murder in the first degree. Thomas Trenchard, the presiding
 justice, dismissed the jurors for the night. They passed down a line of
 police through the crowd outside the courthouse, and crossed Main Street to 
their rooms on the third floor of the Union Hotel. Hauptmann returned to 
his cell in the county jail, at the rear of the courthouse. His wife Anna, 
once more spent the night in the rooms she had rented for herself and their
 year-old son.  Next morning, Feb. 13, 1935, Justice Trenchard reviewed the
 evidence and told the jurors' their duties. Some observers had speculated
 that the Lindbergh child died when accidentally dropped from the ladder.  But the jury was told: Even an accidental death, during commission of a 
burglary, meant “felony murder” and the death penalty.  The jury of six men 
and six women took 11 hours to reach a unanimous verdict: guilty. Despite 
appeals, despite stays of execution by a new governor, Harold Hoffman, 
Bruno Richard Hauptmann, refusing to confess, went to the electric chair at
 Trenton State Prison on April 2, 1936.