The Mountaineers

The Supreme Court of North Carolina has upheld a conviction for murder in the second degree in a case apparently unparalleled in criminal history.

The defendant, one Ves Wingler, married Candace Miller in 1891, and went with her to a cabin in the mountains " 17 or 18 miles from North Wilkesboro, N. C." In May, 1893, she met a violent death. Her husband was the sole witness. On his testimony the coroner's jury brought in a verdict of accidental death, caused by a fall from a loft in the cabin onto the stone hearth in front of the fireplace. In April, 1922, Ves Wingler was arrested, tried and convicted and the judgment affirmed by the Supreme Court carried an indeterminate sentence of from 25 to 30 years.

There is, of course, no Statute of Limitations running in the case of murder, and a murderer may be required to have one trial at any time of his life.

The conviction of Wingler resulted from a curious chain of circumstances. The son of a neighbor assaulted one of Wingler's daughters, and Wingler swore out a warrant for his arrest. The assailant fled, but the neighbor countered by reporting to the authorities a confession alleged to have been made to him by Wingler in 1893. The arrest and conviction followed, although a strenuous defence was maintained and although the only explanation the neighbor gave for his sudden revelation was that he had recently got religion.

Even so august a body as the Supreme Court of North Carolina realized the dramatic possibilities of the case before it.

In addition to two quotations from poems, the opinion closes with such moral observations as: " Though justice sometimes treads with leaden feet, if need be she strikes with an iron hand. Verily, the wages of sin are death and sin pays its wages"; as well as such grim humor as: " There is no error appearing in the record, except the great error of the defendant in murdering his wife."