The Trial of a Fallen City Treasurer
A scathing editorial lambasts former City Treasurer Krug for his 'technical' defense after being caught embezzling public funds.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The conviction of Krug after the ruling of Judge Moore against the motion of the defense for a non-suit was a foregone conclusion. The city charter, sections 9 and 10, of article 9, prescribes the duty of the city treasurer and tells him how he should pay out the public funds; to pay them out in any other manner is to violate the law. The counsel for the defense placed their reliance upon purely technical arguments, as they had no other recourse. Of the moral guilt of their client there is no doubt; he had confessed his guilt by becoming a fugitive from justice and returned to the state under arrest. Judge Moore brushed away this web of technical defense as vigorously as a sturdy housemaid with her broom sweeps away the cobwebs of laborious spiders. Krug is branded as a guilty man by his own confession; his flight was admission. If he escapes legal punishment, it is not because he is not a guilty man, but because our laws are loose or our juries incapable of rising to their duty.
“Judge Moore brushed away this web of technical defense as vigorously as a sturdy housemaid with her broom sweeps away the cobwebs of laborious spiders.”
This 1894 editorial highlights a perennial Seattle obsession: the corruption of public officials and the public's frustration with 'technical' legal maneuvers. Much like modern debates over municipal ethics and accountability, the community’s anger here centers on the betrayal of a high financial trust.
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