R. L. Craven, Officially Sworn In, Becomes 166th Witness for the State

R. L. CRAVEN, sworn for the State in rebuttal at the Trial of Leo Frank in the Fulton County Superior Court of Atlanta Georgia in August 1913 (Testimony Portion From July 28 - August 21, 1913; Closing Arguments August 21-25, 1913)

I am connected with the Beck and Gregg Hardware Co. Albert Mc Knight also works for the same company. He asked me to go down and see if I could get Minola Mc Knight out when she was arrested. I went there for that purpose. I was present when she signed that affidavit (State's Exhibit J). I went out with Mr. Pickett to Minola Mc Knight's home the latter part of May. Albert Mc Knight was there. On the 3rd day of June, we were down at the station house and they brought Minola Mc Knight in and we questioned her first as to the statements Albert had given me; at first she would not talk, she said she didn't know anything about it. I told her that Albert made the statement that he was there Saturday when Mr. Frank came home, and he said Mr. Frank came in the dining room and stayed about ten minutes and went to the sideboard and caught a car in about ten minutes after he first arrived there, and I went on and told her that Albert had said that Minola had overheard Mrs. Frank tell Mrs. Selig that Mr. Frank didn't rest well and he came home drinking and made Mrs. Frank get out of bed and sleep on a rug by the side of the bed and wanted her to give him his pistol to shoot his head off and that he had murdered somebody, or something like that. Minola at first hesitated, but finally she told everything that was in that affidavit. When she did that Mr. Starnes, Mr. Campbell, Mr. February, Albert Mc Knight, Mr. Pickett, and Mr. Gordon were there. When we were questioning her, I don't remember whether anybody but Mr. Pickett and myself and Albert Mc Knight were there.

CROSS EXAMINATION.

We went down there about 11:30 o'clock. I didn't know that she had been in jail twelve hours then. I suppose she was in jail because they needed her as a witness. I was in Mr. Dorsey's office only one time about this matter, the same morning I started out to see if I could get her and I went to see Mr. Dorsey about getting her out. Her husband wanted her out of jail and I went to see Mr. Dorsey about getting her out. At first she denied it. I questioned her for something like two hours. I didn't know she had already made a statement about the truth of the transaction. Mr. Dorsey didn't read it to me. He said she was hysterical and wouldn't talk at all. I went down to get her to make some kind of a statement; I wanted her to tell the truth in the matter. I wanted to see whether her husband was telling the truth or whether she was telling a falsehood. Yes, she finally made a statement that agreed with her husband, and I left after awhile. As to why I didn't stay and get her out, because I didn't want to. I went after we got her statement. No, I didn't get her out of jail. I did not look after her any further than that. I don't think Mr. Dorsey told me to question her. He wanted me to go out to see her. He said Mr. Starnes and Mr. Campbell would be up there and they would let us know about it, and we went up there and Mr. Starnes and Mr. Campbell brought her in. They let us see her all right. I did not ask Campbell or Starnes to turn her out. I didn't ask anybody to turn her out. I never made any suggestion to anybody about turning her out. Nobody cursed, mistreated or threatened this woman while I was there. I don't know what took place before I got there.