The Wrongful Conviction of Charles Croames
After serving years for a brutal murder in Tacoma, a man is finally cleared by the Governor, sparking questions about the original investigation.
Charles Croames, formerly a Tacoma longshoreman, has been pardoned by Governor McBride after serving one-fourth of a 20-year sentence in the state penitentiary. This release is the result of a year of effort by Peter David, a deputy in the Pierce County clerk's office. Croames was convicted for the October 30, 1897, murder of Celia Hansen, a half-breed Indian woman found in a cabin at the corner of Thirty-first and Mac Carver streets in Tacoma, with her throat cut. Croames was found in the bay nearby, also with a severe throat wound, and claimed his mind was blank regarding the events of the night. While the prosecution theorized he killed the woman and attempted suicide, his supporters argued that an unidentified rival murdered the woman and attacked Croames, who then fled in a panic. The discovery of a razor 100 yards from the cabin, in a direction opposite of Croames’ flight, provided the basis for the belief in his innocence.
“The theory of Croames' friends has always been that another man who had some affection for the woman had followed the pair to the cabin and tried to murder them as they lay asleep.”
This case highlights the enduring, often tragic, fallibility of the justice system and the specific vulnerability of marginalized individuals, such as the victim in this 1897 case. Wrongful convictions remain a flashpoint in Washington state politics, reflecting a century-long struggle to balance swift judgment with the necessity of rigorous evidence.
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