Friday, 1st August 1913 Leo Frank Innocent, Says Mrs. Appelbaum

Atlanta Constitution
August 1st, 1913

Acquitted in Same Courtroom, She Is Now Eager Spectator at Big Trial.

A little woman, neatly dressed and wearing a dark hat crowned with a flowing aigrette, slipped quietly into the rear of the courtroom at the afternoon session of the Frank trial yesterday afternoon, and sat down near the press table unnoticed.

Presently, a reporter looked up from his notes, caught sight of her and instantly walked to where she sat. Soon reporters swarmed around her. The press table and trial proceedings were almost deserted for the moment by the Fourth Estate.

She was Mrs. Callie Scott Appelbaum, principal figure in one of Atlanta's recent murder trials, when she was arraigned before the court on a charge of murdering her husband, Jerome Appelbaum, in the Dakota hotel.

Puts Hat on Press Table.

She looked up very much surprised as the reporters came. She smiled and removed her hat, asked if it would be allowed on the press table.

"I didn't want you boys to know I was here," she said sweetly. "That's why I stole in the back way."

The newspaper men prevailed upon her to go into an ante-room where she could be interviewed. In order to keep from attracting notice, she walked into the jury room, where she requested that the interview be short—very short, as she wanted to hear the trial.

The first thing she did was to deny the rumor that has been in circulation for several days to the effect that she had admitted to Detective Bob Waggoner and Attorney Bob Thompson that she shot her husband. She declared it was the first she had heard of the report.

"I have nothing to confess, boys," she stated. "The story as I told it on the stand is the truth. That and nothing more. Every Sunday I go out to Mr. Appelbaum's grave and put flowers upon it. Some Sundays I have been almost too sick to arise from bed, but have always made the trip to the cemetery."

She came to the Frank trial, she said, because she sympathized, with the defendant. She realized how uncomfortable he was under fire of such charges, and, having been once in a similar predicament, said she "kinder" wanted to see how it looked to the "other fellow."

Believes Frank Innocent.

"I do not believe Frank committed the crime," she told. "It doesn't look possible. It looks too much like the work of a negro. I can't conceive how a white man can do such a horrible thing. In the long run, I do not doubt that he will be cleared. Right is right and right will conquer."

She was given a standing invitation by the reporters who are covering the trial to sit at the press table any time she wished to attend the proceedings. She thanked them graciously, saying:

"I think you boys do owe me some consideration. Remember the ‘copy' I once furnished you?"

She said that she had only time to hear Thursday afternoon's session, as she had to stay at work in her hairdressing parlors on Peachtree street. She stated, however, that she would "try to find time to come again."