In re Neagle

• Decision Date: 16 September 1889
• Citation: 39 F. 833
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of California
• Parties: In re NEAGLE.

39 F. 833

In re NEAGLE.

United States Circuit Court, N.D. California.

September 16, 1889

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

This is an application for the discharge of David Neagle upon a writ of habeas corpus. It arises out of the following facts: On the third of September, 1888, certain cases were pending in the circuit court of the United States for the Northern district of California, between Frederick W. Sharon, as executor, against David S. Terry and Sarah Althea Terry, his wife, and between Francis G. Newlands, as trustee, and others, against the same parties, on demurrers to bills to revive and carry into execution the final decree of the court in the suit of William Sharon v. Sarah Althea Hill, and were decided on that day. That suit was brought to have an alleged marriage contract between the parties adjudged to be a forgery, and obtain its surrender and cancellation. The decree rendered adjudged the alleged marriage contract to be a forgery, and ordered it to be surrendered and canceled. The decree was rendered after the death of William Sharon, and was therefore entered as of the day when the case was submitted to the court. By reason of the death of Sharon, it was necessary, in order to execute the decree, that the suit should be revived. Two bills were filed,-- one by the executor of the estate of Sharon; and the other, a bill of revivor and supplemental by Newlands, as trustee, for that purpose. In deciding the cases, the court gave an elaborate opinion upon the questions involved, and, while it was being read, certain disorderly proceedings took place, for which the defendants, David S. Terry and his wife, were adjudged guilty of contempt, and ordered to be imprisoned. The following is an accurate statement of those proceedings slightly condensed from the opinion of the court delivered on the subsequent application of David S. Terry to have the order of commitment revoked. For the whole proceeding, see In re Terry, 36 F. 419.

Shortly before the court opened, the defendants came into the courtroom, and took their seats within the bar at the table next to the clerk's desk, and almost immediately in front of the judges; the defendant David S. Terry being at the time armed with a bowie-knife, concealed on his person, and the defendant Sarah Althea, his wife, carrying in her hand a small satchel, which contained a revolver of six chambers five of which were loaded. The court at the time was held by the justice of the supreme court of the United States allotted to this circuit, who was presiding, the United States circuit judge of this circuit, and the United States district judge of the district of Nevada, called to this district to assist in holding the circuit court. Almost immediately after the opening of the court, the presiding justice commenced reading its opinion in the cases mentioned, but had not read more than one-fourth of it when the defendant Sarah Althea Terry arose from her seat, and asked him, in an excited manner, whether he was going to order her to give up the marriage contract to be canceled. The presiding justice replied: 'Be seated, madam.' She repeated the question, and was again told to be seated. She then cried out, in a violent manner, that the justice had been bought, and wanted to know the price he held himself at; that he had got Newlands' money for his decision, and everybody knew it,-- or words to that effect. It is impossible to give her exact language. The judges and parties present differed as to the precise words used, but all concurred as to their being of an exceedingly vituperative and insulting character. The presiding justice then directed the marshal to remove her from the court-room. She immediately exclaimed that she would not go from the room, and that no one could take her from it, or words to that effect. The marshal thereupon proceeded towards her to carry out the order for her removal, and compel her to leave, when the defendant David S. Terry rose from his seat, evidently under great excitement, exclaiming, among other things, that 'no living man shall touch my wife,' or words of that import, and dealt the marshal a violent blow in his face. He then unbuttoned his coat, and thrust his hand under his vest, where his bowie-knife was kept, apparently for the purpose of drawing it, when he was seized by persons present, his hands held from drawing his weapon, and he himself forced down on his back. The marshal then removed Mrs. Terry from the court-room. Soon afterwards Mr. Terry was allowed to rise, and was accompanied by officers to the door leading to the corridor on which was the marshal's office. As he was about leaving the room, or immediately after stepping out of it, he succeeded in drawing his knife, when his arms were seized by a deputy-marshal and others present, to prevent him from using it, and they were able to take it from him only after a violent struggle. The petitioner, Neagle, wrenched the knife from his hand, while four other persons held on to the arms and body of Terry, one of whom presented a pistol to his head, threatening at the same time to shoot him if he did not give up the knife. To these threats Terry paid no attention, but held on to the knife, actually passing it during the struggle from one hand to the other. Mr. Cross, a prominent attorney, who on that occasion sat next to Mrs. Terry, a little to her left and rear, testifies that, just before she arose to interrupt Justice Field, she nervously worked at the clasp of a small satchel about nine inches long, and tried to open it; and not succeeding, in consequence of her excitement, she hastily sprang to her feet, and interrupted the justice, as hereinbefore stated. Knowing that she had before drawn a pistol from a similar satchel in the master's room, he concluded at this time that she was trying to get her pistol out, and he consequently held himself in readiness to seize her arm as soon as it should appear, and endeavor to prevent its use until he could get assistance, his right arm being partially disabled. For one occasion in the master's office, see Sharon v. Hill, 11 Sawy. 123, 24 F. 726. At this time Mrs. Terry sat directly in front of Justice Field and the circuit judge, less than four yards from either. A loaded revolver was afterwards taken from this satchel by the marshal. For their conduct and resistance to the execution of the order of the court, the defendants, Sarah Althea Terry and David S. Terry, were adjudged guilty of contempt, and ordered to be imprisoned, the former for thirty days, and the latter for six months.

In consequence of the imprisonment which followed, various threats of personal violence to Justice Field and the circuit judge were made by Terry and his wife. Those threats were that they would take the lives of both of those judges. Those against Justice Field were sometimes that they would take his life directly; at other times, that they would subject him to great personal indignities and humiliations, and, if he resented it, they would kill him. These threats were not made in ambiguous terms, but openly and repeatedly, not to one person, but to many persons, until they became the subject of conversation throughout the state, and of notice in the public journals. Reports of these threats through the press, and through reports of the United States marshal and United States attorney, reached Washington, and in consequence of them the attorney general thought proper to give instructions to the marshal of the United States for the Northern district of California to take proper measures to protect the persons of those judges from violence at the hands of Terry and his wife. On the return of Justice Field from Washington to attend his circuit in June last, the probability of an attack by Judge Terry upon him was the subject of conversation throughout the state, and of notices in some of the journals in the city of San Francisco. It was the general expectation that, if Judge Terry met Justice Field, violence would be attempted upon the latter. In consequence of this general belief and expectation, and the fact that the attorney general of the United States had given instructions to the marshal to see that the persons of Justice Field and of the circuit judge should be protected from violence, the marshal of the Northern district appointed the petitioner in this case, David Neagle, to accompany Mr. Justice Field while engaged in the performance of his duties, and while passing from one district to another within his circuit, so as to guard him against the threatened attacks. He was specially commissioned as a deputy by Mr. Franks, whose instructions to him were that he should protect Justice Field at all hazards, and, knowing the violent and desperate character of Terry, that he should be active and alert, and be fully prepared for any emergency, but not to be rash; and, in case any violence was attempted from any one, to call upon the assailant to stop, and to inform him that he was an officer of the United States. Judge Terry was a man of great size and strength, who had the reputation of being always armed with a bowie-knife, in the use of which he was specially skilled, and of showing great readiness to draw and use it upon persons towards whom he entertained any enmity, or had any grievance, real or fancied.

On the 8th of August, 1889, Justice Field left San Francisco for Los Angeles, in order to hear a habeas corpus case which was returnable before him at that city on the 10th of August, and also to be present at the opening of the court on the 12th. He was accompanied by Deputy-Marshal Neagle, the petitioner. Justice Field heard the habeas corpus case on the 10th of August. On the 12th of August he opened the circuit court Judge Ross sitting with him, and he...