Decisions: Of Trials & Women

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Violent death and women have long been an explosive mixture in mystery novels. Their effect on a court of law is often no less potent. Three recent cases:

> Miss Susan Wall, 69, stood accused of killing a woman because of a grudge. The prosecution was confident of its case, and had a star witness who had driven Miss Wall to the victim's home shortly before the killing. But last week, after a day and a half had been spent selecting the jury, Miss Wall's lawyer broke into the proceedings to ask for a conference in chambers. There he told the flabbergasted judge that his client had married the prosecution's key witness; he could therefore not testify against her. Fumed the judge: "This case is one where the law can very justifiably be criticized." Still, nothing could be done. Case dismissed.

> Mrs. Eleanor Freeman, 47, learned one Saturday morning three years ago that her husband had just been gravely injured in a fall from a cargo lift on the Philadelphia waterfront, and he sent word to sue. So she dashed off—not to the hospital, but to her attorney. Suits filed on behalf of living victims, she knew, tend to be more remunerative under Pennsylvania law than suits filed by aggrieved heirs. As the injured man's wife, she was authorized to file a suit on his behalf—but only so long as he remained alive. The complaint was typed up at breakneck speed; the court clerk was called at home and asked to go to the courthouse and stamp it as filed. Counsel arrived at 12:15, the clerk at 12:45; by 1 p.m. the papers were duly stamped. Unfortunately, Mr. Freeman had died at 12:20. But a U.S. judge for the eastern district of Pennsylvania has just ruled that the action could be considered filed at the moment counsel arrived; Mrs. Freeman won her race after all. The damage suit against the shipowner and Universal Terminal & Stevedoring Corp. will now go to trial.

> Mrs. Betty Legg, 34, was married to an Iraan, Texas, oilfield worker who carried two $20,000 life insurance policies that paid double indemnity in case of accidental death. When he died—accidentally, she said—she sued the insurance companies for the double payoff. The companies protested that the death was hardly accidental, since it was caused by a bullet fired from a gun by Mrs. Legg. What's more, they told a Texas jury, she had been charged with murder and was awaiting trial. Mrs. Legg said it was indeed an accident. She had surprised her husband in bed with another woman, she said. She started firing her pistol only to scare the woman, and her husband "accidentally" got in the way of a bullet. Therefore an accident; therefore double indemnity. The jury agreed. The case has been appealed, but if the award is upheld she will get the money even if she is convicted of murder in her criminal trial, a date for which has yet to be set.