The right of an accused person to be heard, either through counsel or himself alone, has been denied in Westwood by Justice G. M. Ottignon, whose legal attainments are not of a very high order. The case at issue was simply this:
John Heck, who lives at Etna and who has an eye on the sheriffship, wanted a domestic in his household, and as his hired man was going to the city for a day, Mr. Heck told him to bring back a servant. The hired man, a Polander, did as directed; in coming home on the afternoon of October 4th, the man and woman were together in the road as Mr. Heck met them.
Heck at once suspected that the woman was not a proper person to enter his household, and refused to receive her. She demanded fifty cents as car fare for her return to the city, but Mr. Heck refused, and gave to the workman $1 which was due him, saying that he should pay the woman's car fare. The pair finally went to Westwood, and there the trouble began.
Here the pair separated, and the woman, crying, went to the depot, and among the men working in the neighborhood begged for money with which to pay her fare. Young Boyer raised sixty-five cents. Some individual stopped her from boarding a train, and she accused the Pole of attempted assault, but afterward drank with the fellow.
Before Justice Ottignon, where she had been taken, she renewed the charge
and a warrant was issued. Officer Aaron Tuers started out armed with an
immense pair of handcuffs; he captured his man and manacled him; then the
prisoner was locked up in the truck house, still handcuffed, while Tuers
went after Mr. Heck.
A "hearing" was ordered on the arrival of Mr. Heck. The reading of the warrant was simply laughable, the officer being unable to read the distinguished Justice's writing. The prisoner had no one to defend him, the Justice refusing to hear even Heck, saying "My mind is made up," and "I'll take that woman's word before I will yours." The defendant himself sought to plead, but the irate magistrate shouted, "Shut up!" and the officer also squelched the defendant.
Just here Mr. Chappell, a retired business man living in Westwood, came to the prisoner's rescue by offering to defend him. But Ottignon declined to permit him to question the plaintiff. This action enraged the crowd in and about the court room, but that was immaterial to "his honor," who directed that the Polander be immediately taken to Hackensack and locked up. The officer at once proceeded to railroad him.
The whole town denounced the action
of Ottignon, and the attention of Judge Zabriskie will be called to the
case. The woman was shipped to New York with the 10:10 p.m. train.
