"The System," As Uncovered by the San Francisco Graft ProsecutionHichborn, Franklin
History
"The System," As Uncovered by the San Francisco Graft Prosecution
Hichborn, Franklin
Political corruption -- California -- San Francisco; San Francisco (Calif.) -- Politics and government
[312] This is the same Ach who dramatically left the Ruef defense at
the time of Ruef's plea of guilty to extortion. See Chapter
XV, page 204.
[313] For immunity contract see page xix of the Appendix. For the
negotiations upon which Ach's claim was based see Chapter XV.
[314] Heney sets forth in his affidavit that Ach's claim did not
surprise him. He says of Ach's statement: "I was not very much
surprised by its substance as I had long before commenced to
suspect that Ruef, Ach, Dr. Kaplan and Dr. Nieto would claim
eventually that such agreement existed in regard to case
number 305 (the extortion case) if it became necessary to do
so in order to keep Ruef out of the penitentiary. In fact I
would not have been greatly surprised by anything that Ach
might have claimed, as I have learned to know him pretty well
and am sometimes at a loss to decide whether he or Ruef is
entitled to first place as an artistic and imaginative
'equivocator,' to use Ruef's language."
[315] See Chapter XV, pages 190-7. Heney states in his affidavit
that both Nieto and Kaplan agreed that Heney's statement of
the arrangement was correct. "Yes, you are right, Mr. Heney,"
the affidavit sets forth Nieto said. "I understand it that
way, and consequently I never told Ruef anything about that.
He never got that from me." The affidavit sets forth that
Kaplan said in substance: "Yes, that is what you said, Mr.
Heney, but I always understood that Mr. Ruef would be allowed
to withdraw his plea of guilty in the French Restaurant cases
and would not receive any punishment."
Heney replied in substance: "You may have so understood,
Doctor, but you had no right so to understand from anything
which I said."
[316] Heney, in his closing argument, told the jury that Ruef had
not been put on the stand because the prosecution did not
trust him. Heney said: "Nobody except Mr. Ford and Mr. Ruef
could tell about it (the passing of the $200,000). They did
not complain about my asking why they did not put Mr. Ruef on
the stand. They asked why we didn't put him on the stand and
vouch for his veracity and enable them to put words in his
mouth, and I will answer now, because we DID NOT TRUST HIM."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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