The People of the State of Michigan - - - (Complainants)

VS

William Shimmel - - - (Defendant)

Darwin G. Shavalier

           Cross Examination

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Page 215

 

 

 

CROSS EXAMINATION BY MR. PARK.

 

 

Q

What paper was that you saw it in?

A

The Grand Rapids Press.

 

 

Q

The Grand Rapids Evening Press?

A

Yes, sir.

 

 

Q

It comes to your house every day, does it?

A

Yes, sir, I have taken it for the last eight or nine years.

 

 

Q

How long have you lived in Sullivan?

A

A trifle over nine years.

 

 

Q

Raised sugar beets all that time?

A

Yes, sir, this is my ninth year in growing sugar beets.

 

 

Q

What were you doing on the farm on the 24th of April 1906

A

Conducting the work on the place, looking after the people that were working.

 

 

Q

Putting out sugar beets?

A

No, we were fitting land for sugar beets.

 

 

Q

Who did you have working on the farm that day?

A

Oh I couldn’t tell exactly, I don’t think I remember.

 

 

Q

What particular work were they doing that day?

A

They were dragging.

 

 

Q

Who was dragging?

A

I think Mr. Botruff.

 

 

Q

Who else?

A

Mr. Young.  It would be hard to tell exactly what people worked on that particular day.

 

 

Q

What were you doing the day before, dragging or ploughing?

A

No. Of course those people never ploughed.  I only had a trifle over ten acres ploughed last spring.

 

 

Q

They were dragging it over?

 

 

 

Page 216

 

 

A

They were dragging it over.

 

 

Q

What were they doing the day before that?

A

I suppose they were working there if they were working.

 

 

Q

And the day after you saw Shimmel drive through Sullivan what did you do on the farm?

A

Oh, I couldn’t say.

 

 

Q

Did you go to the village of Sullivan every day?

A

Yes, sir, I live there.

 

 

Q

You live right there?

A

Yes, sir.

 

 

Q

You telephone to your customers about feed about every week or month do you?

A

No, I think I telephoned on the 10th of April.

 

 

Q

The 10th of April 1906?

A

And I telephoned on the 24th of April 1906, and then it was some little time before I telephoned again, perhaps a week or two weeks, I couldn’t tell, just as it happened.

 

 

Q

When you telephoned there did you make a record on the telephone books in the store?

A

Do I?

 

 

Q

Yes.

A

No, the people there do that.

 

 

Q

The people that take charge of the telephone?

A

Yes, sir, Mr. Spoon or his wife.

 

 

Q

You have no way of knowing whether they made that correct or not except as you found it?

A

No, I have not.

 

 

Q

You say that the first time you telephoned before hat was on

 

 

 

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Q

the 10th of April?

A

The next time before that was on the 10th of April, yes, sir.

 

 

Q

You are positive you didn’t telephone between the 10th of April and April 23rd?

A

No, sir, April 24th.

 

 

Q

Did you telephone on the 25th?

A

No, sir.

 

 

Q

When was the next time you telephoned?

A

Well I think it was a week or ten days after that or to weeks, something or anther.

 

 

Q

You have no other way of telling that this was the 24t except as you have found it on the books kept by the people in the store there?

A

Yes, sir, that is proper.

 

 

Q

As April 24th?

A

That is proper.

 

 

Q

If it was the 23rd and they had set it down April 24th it is their mistake and not yours?

A

But I have something else.

 

 

Q

I am not asking you about anything else.

A

I went down to Mr. Drennen’s where I get my feed to see at what date he shipped that feed to me and he shipped it on the morning April 25th, the next morning after I telephoned.

 

 

Q

And can you swear positively that he shipped it the next morning except from his books?

A

That is all I can say, just from his books.

 

 

Q

You have no way of telling whether it was the 24th or 25th except as you saw it on the books?

A

That is it.

 

 

 

Page 218

 

 

Q

What kind of a horse was Shimmel driving when he went through there that day?

A

Why a kind of a dark colored horse, I should judge it was a bay.

 

 

Q

A nice looking horse?

A

Why just a fair looking horse, I didn’t take much notice of the horse.

 

 

Q

What kind of harness did the horse have on?

A

Oh I couldn’t tell.

 

 

Q

You say it was an open buggy?

A

Yes, sir.

 

 

Q

You are positive about that?

A

Yes sir.

 

 

Q

Did you ever see the horse and buggy before?

A

I don’t know as I ever did.

 

 

Q

Have you seen it since?

A

Not as I know of.

 

 

Q

Do you know whose it was?

A

I do not only by hearsay.

 

 

Q

You say that was about four o’clock?

A

I think so, somewheres near four o’clock.  Of course a man coming out of a field and not noticing he cannot tell just to the hour, but I should judge it was in the neighborhood of four o’clock in the afternoon.

 

 

Q

Who else was with you when you saw him?

A

Oliver Alfred Lenquist, his name is.

 

 

Q

He lives right there in Sullivan does he?

A

He lives nearly half a mile south of Sullivan

 

 

 

Page 219

 

 

Q

You know him well?

A

Yes, sir, I have known him for years.

 

 

Q

Who else was there?

A

That is all I was talking with at that time.

 

 

Q

Just you two?

A

Just those two.

 

 

Q

Did anyone else in Sullivan see him go through there?

A

Not that I know of.  In fact I never gave it a thought.

 

 

Q

You have seen him go through there before hadn’t you?

A

Why I had not saw the gentleman not since he left there I don’t think from work.

 

 

Q

In 1901?

A

Yes, sir, I think it was about 1901.  I might have met him on the road somewheres betwixt that time, but I don’t remember.

 

 

Q

You would not swear positively that you had ever met him since then?

A

Since what?

 

 

Q

Since 1901

A

Oh yes, I would swear positively that he passed there.

 

 

Q

Passed through there?

A

Yes, sir.

 

 

Q

With a horse and buggy?

A

Yes, sir.

 

 

Q

On several occasions?

A

No, I didn’t say that.

 

 

Q

The same horse and buggy?

A

I said one.

 

 

Q

Did he have the same horse and buggy?

A

He only had the one horse and buggy, that ever I saw him drive,