On the same morning Jean Gianini, sixteen years old, left his father's house on the edge of the village to go to the home of Sam Hutchinson, where he was working and taking his meals. He had his breakfast, went to the barn, and worked a short time. When Mr. Hutchinson went out a little later, he could not find Jean. A Mr. Smith said he had seen him going down the tracks toward Newport. William Taylor, the track foreman, said he passed Jean near the bridge. Mr. Hutchinson then sent word to the boy's father that he had gone. The father, supposing his son had run away as he frequently did, telephoned to Newport asking that he be apprehended and sent home. This was before anything was known of the crime. Peck Newman, to whom the father telephoned, found Jean in a grocery store in Newport. He had been apprehended at the depot. He was taken home and then to the Justice of the Peace. Here he was stripped, presumably for the purpose of discovering whether there was any blood upon his clothing or his body. Although there is no evidence that any stains were found, yet he had no sooner been stripped than he made a free and open confession. We shall consider this confession in detail later. In substance he said that he killed Miss Beecher to get revenge, because she had humiliated him in school. He told in detail how he had accomplished this and what had been his movements shortly before and after the deed. On the strength of this confession and such corroborative evidence as could be obtained from local witnesses the prosecution sought to convict this boy of murder in the first degree. It was understood at first that the defense would attempt to prove that he was insane. There did not seem to be much evidence of insanity and it did not appear that the prosecution was in great fear of such a verdict. As a matter of fact, the real defense was imbecility. It is probable that this defense was less intelligible to people who knew Jean Gianini than that of insanity would have been. To one familiar with imbecility, however, there is no shadow of a doubt of the correctness of this diagnosis. The only possible question in the mind of any such person would be whether a defective of such high grade knew the nature and quality of his act and knew that it was wrong, and was therefore responsible for his act. This point the jury decided, and we shall attempt to show by a study of the case that they decided correctly. Much of the confusion in the mind of the public and dissatisfaction with the result in this case is due to a failure to understand the nature and character of the imbecile. Most of the acts and the utterances of the defendant, which seemed to many people to indicate his soundness of mind, his premeditation and planning of the murder, are in reality so thoroughly characteristic of the imbecile as to leave no doubt whatever of his low mentality.