Excerpt from Trial of Medad M'kay, for the Murder of His Wife, Before Chief Justice Spencer, 1820; And Before His Honor William W. Van Ness, 1821; At Allegany: Embracing a Brief Outline of the Former Trial, and a Detail of the Latter; Including the Testimony, and Speeches of Messrs., Collier, Haight, Matthews and Hulbert, With the Charge of the Judge to the Jury Medad m'kay was indicted at the general sessions in Alle any, for the murder of his wife, by administering arsenic. Here being no resident district attorney in that county, the court appointed D. Cruger, Esq. Of Steuben county, to perform that duty. Mr. Cruger prepared the cause for trial but his clerk neglected to put a seal to the venire. The cause was brought to trial, at the oyer and terminer in Allegany, 1820, be fore chiefjffstice Spenceraand after along and solemn in vestiga tion of the subject the prisoner was convicted The following day he was called on to show cause, if any he had, why judg ment should not pass upon him. V. Matthews, Esq. One of the prisoner's counsel suggested to the court the probability, that there might be some illegality in the proceedings as the statute stated that the venire should be issued by the district attorney, and it appeared there was no resident, or special dis triet attorney in the county He requested a few moments to look at the statute, and likewise to examine the venire which was granted. On an examination of the venire, it was discov ered that there was no return endorsed by the sheriff, and that it was destitute of a seal. These objections being raised, the chief justice suspended judgment, and the prisoner was brought up from the county of Allegany, [before the supreme court] on a habeas corpus. And the indictment and proceedings against him in the court of oyer and terminer and gaol delivery, in that county, were returned in obedience to a writ of certiorari di rected for that purpose. This cause was Very ably argued, by Messrs. Oakley, (lgattorney general) and Collier for the people, and Hudson and alcott for the prisoner after which the Opin ion of the court was delivered by chief justice Spencer, as follows. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.