CORRUPTION: A Woman's Turn

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Out of the record in the same case she had stricken her statement to defense counsel that he was "going to be limited" in presenting evidence. Later she cut him short with a refusal to hear more of his witnesses—and then deleted it from the record. She practically forced the defendant to take the stand, ordered her to "get up" and "stop arguing." But from the revised record Magistrate Norris had also edited these judicial imperatives. The defendant was convicted, sent to the work house for 100 days.

Stubbornly Magistrate Norris last week refused to agree with Referee Seabury that her changes were "striking and substantial" in a fair-trial appeal and tended to put her "on record in a fairer and more impartial position." Her only defense: "An error of judgment ... an error of judgment. ... I made the changes according to my recollection of what I said."

Two other factors weighed against the "woman's judge of women": 1) she had dealt in the stock of a bail bond company which did business in her court; 2) she always refused to question the veracity of vice squad policemen in a prostitution case.

Kenna Case. In its corollary investigation into bribe-taking policemen who operate in magistrates' courts, the Seabury inquiry turned up this item last week:

Six years ago Police Lieutenant John W. Kenna was placed in charge of about 1,000 policemen in the midtown section of Manhattan, called "The Tenderloin," which abounds in speakeasies and vice resorts. His salary for the period amounted to $20,000. He and his mother, however, have banked during the six years a total of $237,000.