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The Jersey City News
Jersey City, Hudson County, New Jersey
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In Camden, NJ, on March 28, 1900, a jury failed to agree in the trial of Philadelphia reporters William R. Hay and Howard K. Sloan for conspiring to damage Eugene Darnell's reputation via a false confession story implicating him in Eli Shaw's 1897 murders of his mother and grandmother. The reporters face retrial.
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Trial Over Shaw Confession Was Not Convincing.
[Special to "The Jersey City News."]
CAMDEN, March 28, 1900.-After having been out since four o'clock yesterday afternoon, the jury in the case of William R. Hay and Howard K. Sloan, the Philadelphia newspaper men who were tried for conspiring to injure the reputation of Eugene Darnell of this city, came into court shortly after ten o'clock this morning, and announced that they had failed to agree. They were discharged. The reporters will probably be tried again at the next term of court which will convene next Tuesday.
The trial of Hay and Sloan was the result of publication last September in a Philadelphia newspaper of an alleged confession by Eli Shaw, of this city, that he had killed his mother and grandmother. The two women were murdered at their home in October, 1897, and Shaw was arrested charged with the crime. He was tried on two indictments and acquitted both times. The newspaper story written by Hay and Sloan stated that Shaw had finally been induced to confess and that he had implicated Eugene Darnell as an accessory after the fact.
Sloan caused Darnell's arrest on this charge, but he proved an alibi and was released. Darnell then swore out warrants for the arrest of Hay and Sloan, charging them with conspiracy. Yesterday three witnesses, one of them Shaw's former fiancee, testified that Shaw had admitted his guilt in their presence after his acquittal.
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Location
Camden
Event Date
March 28, 1900
Story Details
Philadelphia reporters Hay and Sloan published a false confession by acquitted murderer Eli Shaw implicating Darnell, leading to Darnell's brief arrest and release on alibi. Darnell charged the reporters with conspiracy; jury disagreed after trial with witnesses confirming Shaw's private guilt admission.