Defamation Suit Filed Over 'Thieves and Skinners' Remark
A local merchant is suing for $10,000 in damages after being publicly accused of being a 'thief and skinner' by a man on Madison Street.
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.
J. W. Van Brocklin was made defendant in a suit for slander instituted yesterday by Hastings & Stedman, acting as attorneys for John Woodhouse, a member of the firm of Woodhouse Bros., who keep a store on Madison street, near Rose. In his complaint, Woodhouse alleges that he has hitherto borne a good name for integrity and was never suspected of the crime of larceny; that on last Friday, in the presence of worthy persons, Van Brocklin maliciously uttered the following: 'These fellows are a lot of thieves, robbers and skinners. They would steal the pennies off a dead man's eyes.' Mr. Woodhouse alleges that his good name and reputation have been damaged to the extent of $10,000.
“They would steal the pennies off a dead man's eyes.”
Public defamation suits remain a common way for businesses to protect their reputation in Seattle, though the 1893 language regarding 'stealing pennies off a dead man's eyes' is a vivid, colorful reminder of how frontier-era insults carried heavy weight in court.
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