Conan Doyle For The Defense, Fox - B

                                                This is an interesting little piece based on a real life murder mystery that caught Doyle's eye. In 1908, a wealthy woman in Glasgow was brutally murdered and the police took the easy way out. They arrested, and eventually convicted, an unemployed immigrant, Oscar Slater, of the murder. Their primary proof was that he pawned a diamond brooch and that the victims' diamond brooch was missing. The fact that the descriptions of the two pieces of jewelry were completely different didn't enter into the equation. Two eye witnesses were pressured into identifying Slater. Of the fifteen members of the jury, nine voted to convict him. As a foreigner, Jew, gambler and low class habituate of brothels, he was the perfect scapegoat.  His hanging sentence was commuted to life and he spent over twenty-years in a brutal northern Scotland prison. Twice Doyle got involved. In 1912, he read every word of the investigation and trial and wrote an 80 page booklet eviscerating the logic of the conviction. Two years later, after a top Glaswegian  detective pointed out the correctness of Doyle's booklet, the case was reopened but upheld after the police closed ranks. The prisoner got a secret request out to Doyle who tried again in 1925. He teamed up with a Scottish journalist for another book. He orchestrated a public relations campaign to free Slater. The two witnesses were found and both retracted their stories. The Secretary for Scotland ordered his release. Justice was served. The interesting aspect of this book is the background on the education and life of Doyle, who was knighted and quite active in British public life.