Lizzie Borden Society Forum

Where the jurors ever interviewed ?
I was wondering if the axe murder of Bertha Manchester while Lizzie was in jail influenced the jurors . If they might have assumed that the killer of Bertha also killed the Bordens .

Yes, it is hard to believe that the Manchester murders did not influence the jurors.

It was a fortunate occurrence for Lizzie. There was another Axe murder in Fall River and the victim received 23 blows to the back of the head just like Abby.

Yes, this most likely placed great doubt in the minds of the jurors who heard the news of the Manchester murder just 5 days before the Borden trial was to begin. Even when the accused in the Manchester murder was jailed, the Borden case jurors were already tucked away and never heard the news of the arrest, which was released the day the trial of Lizzie Borden began.

To think that the jurors did not consider this is not realistic.

How much of it influenced the outcome of the Borden Trail is unknown.....at least to me.

Our Diana wrote about this in The Hatchet, Issue 1, No 2, "Exploding A Myth- The Manchester Connection," pgs. 50-52.

She points out that the murder happened 6 days prior to the start of Lizzie Borden's trial (May 30th); that Charles Holmes seemed to try to create a reasonable doubt in the jurors while being quoted extensively in the papers showing comparisons, but that The Evening Standard did the opposite- relying on the differences between the murders in its coverage; that Jose Correiro was already a named suspect on May 31st, surrendered June 3rd, June 4th held, and made headlines on the 5th with the fact that he was now charged. There was a recess after voire dire on the 5th, in Lizzie's trial, and during that time news of Correiro that was not yet heard could have been disseminated.

Folks who were about to be sequstered in a muder trial might very well be extrememly interested in this other hatchet murder and very likely did find out that Bertha Manchester's murder had been solved.

YES KAT: Even if the jurors did find out that an arrest was made and the murder of big Bertha had been arrested...........,still, there was an ax murderer out there. He had been found. He used an ax. He killed Bertha in the same way Abby was killed. In the juror's minds Correira could have done both murders, Bertha and the Bordens. After all, what are the odds. Even if they knew or discovered that Correira had entered the country eight months after the Borden murders, a seed of doubt was planted.

Either way...........whether they knew a murderer was discovered, they did not know the particulars behind it. In their minds, the accused, Jose (Manuel?)Corriera could have been a rampart killer.

Though the effect and outcome of the Borden case may have nothing to do with knowledge of the Manchester Murder, the information had to rest in the back of the juror's minds and tipped the scale just enough or made it much easier, or set their minds at rest in voting Not Guilty.

If nothing else, it would have supported the contention that an axe was more likely to be used by a man than by a woman.

With the exception of the use of an axe/hatchet as the murder weapon there is little similarity between the two crimes. The Manchester case was essentially a robbery gone terribly wrong.

According to the confessed murderer, Correiro, it was Bertha who first grabbed the axe and tried to prevent him from leaving when she caught him in the act of robbery.

Manchester was known to have treated his hired farm hands quite harshly, feeding them poorly and trying to not pay them fully. The police suspected a farm hand almost from the first and it was so mentioned in the papers before the sequestering of the jury.

Yes, another killing by an axe/hatchet would probably be in the back of the jury's minds but in no way was it the determining factor in their verdict.

To answer the original query in this thread, I've never read anything about the jury members being asked about the Manchester case. It is also significant that in jury selection they were not asked anything about. it.

Yes, you are right Harry: I have never read anything about jurors and their deliberations, or newspaper talk about the Manchester murders, or a connection and any conclusive declarations by anyone on the jury about how the Bertha murder affected the outcome of the Borden case.

As you say, it probably had nothing to do with the "not guilty verdict".

But, it did play up in the press and the common juror on the street would very well exercise doubt.

For the most part, the real connection between the Borden and Manchester murders is in the literary world. Makes for great suspense, conversation and fodder for a chapter, if one is writing a book.

mbhenty @ Tue Oct 27, 2009 1:09 pm wrote:. . .
For the most part, the real connection between the Borden and Manchester murders is in the literary world. . . .

So true!

The idea that the Manchester murder may have impacted the jury’s verdict didn’t really come up until over 90 years after the trial. Robert Sullivan (Goodbye Lizzie Borden) was the first author to suggest this and he was referenced again and again: by Frank Spiering in 1984, Arnold Brown in 1991, Rick Geary in 1997, Paul Dennis Hoffman in 2000, and Walter Hixson in 2001.

The key point these authors fail to address is that four days before the jury was sequestered, the New Bedford Evening Standard ( June 1, 1893) reported Correiro had not arrived in the U.S. until about eight months after the Borden tragedy and screaming headlines on June 4, the day before the trial opened, proclaimed that Correiro was “IN JAIL – CHARGED WITH KILLING BERTHA MANCHESTER’ (Victorian Vistas 384-85)

Authors closer to the actual events make absolutely no connection between the two cases. In 1893 Edwin Porter, a reporter for the Fall River Globe, wrote at length about the trial in The Fall River Tragedy and never mentioned the Manchester murder. In The Knowlton Papers, a voluminous compilation of correspondence received from the general populace as well as people closely involved with the case, the only mention of the Manchester murders is a light hearted aside from Dr. Draper.

So if the general citizenry of Fall River and environs, a reporter covering the trial, principals involved in the case, and Lizzie’s defence team didn’t invoke the Manchester murder in their deliberations, I’m guessing the jury probably didn’t either.







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Yes, diana.......

Very interesting stuff. I was very surprised that such succulent news, headlines that were well reported in it's day, was never mentioned in Porter, Radin, Pearson, Lincoln and de Mille.

What a lost opportunity, what great gossip, framework begging a scenario. How did they miss it.

To be honest, I knew it was not mentioned by the authors above, I was not aware that it was first reported by Sullivan.

The Manchester murder was greatly played up by the press who recognized the great occasion for a story, for drama, theatrics. Charles Holmes did his best to stir the pot while Lizzie's defense team celebrated the events brought on by Bertha's death.

It was a great option for Jennings to try the case in the press, and with the public, even if it had no palpable benefit for Lizzie.

Though the case was probably not made by the jurors and the Manchester incident completely dismissed, again, there were some similarities. Both crimes were vicious. The blows given were very close, 19 and 23. Both Abby and Bertha were killed around the same time of day, both killed with blows by an axe to the back of the head, both murders committed in late morning.

Even though there are similarities, the contrasts are just as compelling.

Even the way Lizzie was treated, given liberties, the press reports that Jose C. was not treated civilly and even abused. Even this became a great story which proved, in a way, how society felt about the guilt of a women in such a hideous crimes. Though much had to do with affluence, in Jose Correira's account, he was probably deemed guilty even before he was tried.

He was deemed guilty because he confessed, and showed the police where evidence was hidden. He was not tried.