Page:The "Trial" of Ferrer - A Clerical Judicial Murder (IA 2916970.0001.001.umich.edu).pdf/32

 they are extremely weak; one says he "believes"; another that "a newspaper man told him that it semed to him from what he had heard"; another "has formed the opinion," etc. It is astonishing that the Prosecution who refused the evidence of the letters written by Ferrer to his friends abroad on the pretext of their not throwing any light on the case, who also practically prevented the relatives of Ferrer and his employes, banished to Teruel, from testifying—it is astonishing that the Prosecution accepted such vague and second-hand declarations. But had they not accepted them, then nothing would have remained; so they had to accept them.

Let us now examine the evidence gathered in the second class. Here we have three declarations which contain actual facts. But are these facts in the least incriminating? The declaration of Ardid is only the report of a banal conversation, such as any two peaceful citizens would very likely hold on the evening of an incipient revolution. The declaration of the two dragoons, even if we accepted it in spite of all the circumstances which render its value almost worthless, does not imply that the man in a "blue serge suit and straw hat" who was peacefully reading a proclamation was doing anything illegal. As to the declaration of the barber Domenech, which was used as a corner stone by the prosecution, if we examine it carefully we will see that instead of implicating Ferrer in the leadership of the insurrection it proves that he was not such a leader.

Ferrer went, according to Domenech, to the office of "El Progreso" to see what the comrades had decided to do, not to give them orders as a leader would. The declaration would tend to show, admitting its veracity, that Ferrer had taken part in the movement, but not that he was one of its leaders. Indeed it would depict him as a very non-