Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 20.pdf/116

 AMERICAN CODE OF LEGAL ETHICS Mr. Phillips and Mr. Clarkson were employed to defend a man named Courvoisier, a Swiss valet, against the charge of having murdered his employer. The em ployer, Lord William Russell, was 72 years old, deaf and infirm, and was murdered in his bed. He was a widower, and his house hold consisted of a woman cook, a house maid, and the valet. While it seemed clear that someone in the house committed the crime, the prisoner's counsel went to the trial convinced that he was innocent. They cross-examined Sarah Mancer, one of the women servants, closely, to show there was as much probability that the witness or the other servant was the criminal as the prisoner, and that the police, incited by the hopes of the large rewards offered, had. conspired to fasten the suspicion un justly on the prisoner. After the crossexamination, and during the trial, some missing plate belonging to the murdered nobleman was discovered, and the person with whom it was left identified Courvoisier as the one who left it with her. Courvoisier at the time was in the prison yard, but a few minutes later, after he had returned to the court room, he confessed his guilt to his counsel, but insisted that they defend him. Immediately there was an illustra tion of the fact that a conscientious lawyer's knowledge of his client's guilt robs his endeavors in that client's behalf of their efficacy. At once all attempt to cast suspicion on the innocent servants was abandoned, though for a long time many believed otherwise, and the defense inter posed failed. When Courvoisier's confession was published, Mr. Phillips was attacked and lied about by the newspapers, and for nine years he endured it in silence. Finally on November, 1849, nine years after the trial, he presented his side of the matter. He did that at the earnest solicitation of his friend, Charles Warren, to whom the letter from which the writer is now going to quote was written:

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"Nov. 20 [1849]. ' ' My Dear Warren : — Your truly kind letter induces me to break the contemptuous silence, with which for nine years I haje treated the calumnies to which you allude. I am the more induced to this by the repre sentations of some valued friends that many honorable minds begin to believe the slander because of its repetition without receiving a contradiction. It is with disgust and disdain, however, that even thus solicited 1 stoop to notice inventions too abominable, I had hoped, for any honest man to have believed . . . "First, I am accused of having retained Courvoisier's brief after having heard his confession. It is right that I should relate the manner of that confession, as it has been somewhat misapprehended. Many suppose it was made to me alone, and made in the prison. I never was in the prison since I was called to the bar, and but once before, being invited to see it by the then sheriffs. So strict is this rule, that the late Mr. Fauntlcroy solicited a consultation there in vain with his other counsel and myself. It was on the second morning of the trial, just before the judges entered, that Courvoisier, standing publicly in front of the dock, solicited an interview with his counsel. My excellent friend and colleague, Mr. Clarkson, and myself immediately approached him. I beg of you to mark the presence of Mr. Clarkson, as it will become very material presently. Up to this morning I believed most firmly in his innocence, and so did many others as well as myself. ' I have sent for you, gentle men,' he said, 'to tell you that I committed th.e murder!' When I could speak, which was not immediately. I said, 'Of course, then you are going to plead guilty?' 'No, sir," was flie reply, 'I expect you to defend me to the utmost. ' We returned to our seats. My position at this mpment was, I believe, without parallel in the annals of the pro fession. I at once came to the resolution of abandoning the case, and so I told mv colleague. He strongly and urgently re monstrated against it, but in vain. At last he suggested our obtaining the opinion of the learned judge who was not trying the cause, upon what he considered to be the professional etiquette, under circumstances so embarrassing. In this I very willingly acquiesced. We obtained an interview, and Mr. Baron Parke requested to know dis