The Leo Frank Case: The Lynching of a Guilty Man Part 20

ONE OF the most mysterious aspects of the Leo Frank case is the series of “death notes,” four of which were written, according to testimony, but only two of which were ever found. They were discovered right next to the dead body of Frank’s victim, 13-year-old Mary Phagan. If taken at face value, they appear as though they were written by Mary while she was being assaulted. But they also are written in an approximation of the African-American vernacular of that time and in a semi-literate style that Mary Phagan would have been extremely unlikely to use. Were they written by a Black killer, in a hopelessly botched attempt to throw investigators off the trail? Or were they created by a clever killer to make us think that the murderer was a Black man? Were they perhaps even dictated by the killer to a compliant Black man to write, who would thereby impose his genuine style — and handwriting — on them?

Originally posted on The American Mercury:
https://theamericanmercury.org..../2018/09/the-leo-fra