New Britain Herald Newspaper, July 12, 1930, Page 3

temroms SA KEYES, who sent more than 5,000 men and women to prison during the twenty-five years he was assistant prosecutor and chief prosecutor of Los Angeles County, has a new job. He is now “counsel for the cons,” in San Quentin Prison, California, where he is serving from one to fourteen years for accepting more than $100,000 in bribes to “go easy” with the defendants in the malodorous $100,000,000 Julian Petroleum Corporation scandal. Although Keyes, only No. 48218 now, is engaged in giving legal advice to felons, Warden Holohan has thrown every safeguard about him, fearing some revengeful convict sent up by Keyes may attempt to kill him. Keyes speaks to the advice-seeking convicts through an iron-barred window in the office of the captain of the yard. Alert guards stand by, ready to save Keyes from sudden, vicious attack. Warden Holohan is taking no chances. For many of the very men who now seek his advice on their civil rights or chances of securing a parole were sent to “sti’”” by the once-proud and power- ful prosecutor of Los Angeles County. Not all the 5,000 sent up to San Quentin by Keyes bear him ill will, James J. McNamara, serving a life sentence for murder in connection y with the bombing of the Los An- ' gele’s Times Building, was prose- | cuted by Keyes. Yet when the iron gates shut behind the ex-district at- torney, he found a pillow and a pair of slippers, gifts from Mec- Namara, in his cell. But there are hundreds of “the boys” in San Quentin who would p welcome the chance to slip a knife between Keyes’s ribs or slam a blackjack over his head. The prison authorities have heard too many advance rumblings of this storm of venomous hate against Keyes to leave him unguarded even for an instant. By EDWARD BOYDEN. 6§ T’S a long lane ”’ Hundreds of convicts in San Quentin, muttered the old saw when Asa Keyes, veteran district attorney of California, was locked up as one of them recently. Asa Keyes, convict! Shorn of his hair by a man he had sent th shorn of his name by the State betrayed; photographed by a conv he had prosecuted, Keyes finds self just another figure in gray amon 4,943 other felons. And yet how different! In his twenty-five years in the Lo el prosecutor’s office—twenty district attorney and five as attorney—Keyes had sent over 5,000 other men and women through the same prison gates that finally opened before and closed behind him. Something like 2,000 of them are there now—Norman Selby, the one- time Kid McCoy, famous pugilist, who slaughtered Theresa Mors; Clara Phillips, who pounded Alberta Mead- ows to death with a hammer; Mrs. Myrtle Mellus, Beverly Hills society matron; Gordon Stewart Northcott, young master of a “murder farm” in Southern_ California, and his old mother, Mrs. Louise Northcott; Mrs. i Margaret Miller, sensational trunk murderess; James P. (‘“Bluebeard”) Watson, serving a life term for the wholesale murder of his series of i wives; McNamara, whose alleged bombing of the Los Angeles Times Building 20 years ago cost 25 liv i and innumerable less famous but equally dangerous criminals. The window of Keyes’ prison “of- | fice” looks out on the recreation yard, where most of the murderers, kid- napers, embezzlers and former city and county officials, whom he as an aggressive prosecutor sent there, take their daily exercise. Many and frequent are the black looks of hate that go up to the little barred window shielding Keyes from 5 Yoo vil men would gladly pay with h the privilege of two minut with ¢l stern man who sent A Grim “Stretch” for the District Attorney Who Sentenced Many for Larceny, as He Took $100,000! HAUNTING EYES The Nightmare of Prisoners’ Photos Scattered All Around Keyes on This Page “ Represents the convicts — convicts— convicts that he sees all day and in his Any number of these im there restless sleep.” But Warden Holohan i office of the recreation yard “It would be a terrible the W ETEIT a complete “‘mo whose curl in- a venom- snar] as v listen to words of and deputy n from among the inmat There are enough men of culture and education confined there for a “blue ribbon” ju fendants w Finding experienc 1d, of course, ners now in Cali " are no less thar six forn ublic rom Los Angele e; Channing Follete, for- mer municipal court judge, ving ti er tigator; Deputy St e for perjury and atte i brib- f rict attorney's inves- iffs Walter Lipps and William J. Anderson are the for accepting a $10,000 bride, three other prisoners are ex-policemen found guilty of mal lowed to mix with the other prisoners were during the daily exercise hour. with the prisoners but don't dare,” says Warden Holohan, “Too many photograph rint departme; p—everywhere convicts from County—men who remer men Keyes remembered “Sure Keyes sent me up,” sistant prison photographer These men, but not Keyes, are al- “1 would like to let Keyes mingle have knives improvised from scissors never thought I would they steal from the tailor shop or from files taken from the jute mill. It is re of sitting him down d mugging him.” impossible to keep these weapons out the former di on of the more than walked towards the JUST NO. 48218 Former District Attorney Asa Keyes, as Shaved and Photographed by 2 of ' the 5,000 Criminals He “sent over” to San Quentin. en ot tal $100,0 IN DAYS OF GLORY Above and at Left: Keyes in One of His Fiercely Emphatic Oratorical Moods While Sentencing a Culprit; and Leaving Court, His Brief Case Stuffed with Evidence Against Evil- doers He Later Joined as an Unwilling comrade” in Jail Why Convict Keves Is Most Detested ()E of the prisoncrs in San Quentin, whose name is not used, “All we liave to do here is | law, we hate the prosecutor m en w ested, either or by warrant, we can't take it ou is usually fair and the jury usnally S impersc quently visualizing our misdeed rrors that weigh again. ferrets out witnesses agai we think should be admitted. He demands, always, the severes Later he frequently consent when our the bitterest disap; nvict's life two-thirds of the convicts are ir kind—larceny. And while Kes thefts, he was stealing $100.000: And over all, in But the prose or, oratory, summing up and de 2 our conviction to protect society, fre- < of the in the act The judge with his st us, he nst us, | hallenzes testimony in our favor that t penalty. le time comes, this case e common to all n BRI R BN 00 e LTI L Z N W N\ e SN Qs s s, s T N SO AN