Silver Lake – The fine residence and three barns of Matthew Cahill burned to the ground Saturday night. All the contents of the house were lost, including $300 in money. The cattle and horses were saved, but hay, tools and all other contents of the barns were destroyed in the raging fire. Mrs. Cahill and an orphan boy were alone at the time, Mr. Cahill being away. The cause of the fire is supposed to be spontaneous combustion. There was $2300 insurance we understand, which is but a fraction of the loss.

Clifford – Mrs. Ruth Rivenburg, wife of our merchant, L. H. Rivenburg, is quite low with what the doctors call consumption, and are treating her with the Frieidman remedy, but with no favorable results thus far. She lives in a tent, where she proposes to spend the winter. ALSO J. I. Tripp has purchased of I. J. Wetherby, two acres of land joining the old Clifford cemetery, to cemetery purpose.

Rush Township – Ude James met with what might have been a severe accident last Monday after school. His horse became frolicsome and upset his buggy but was captured by Sam Hyde.

Jackson – Mrs. F. J. Austin will be at Central Hotel with millinery goods, Tuesday and Wednesday, Oct. 21 & 22nd.

Montrose – Leon Chesley, the popular barber, lost out in his bet on the World Series and rolled an egg, with his nose, from his barber shop to the Tarbell House. “Leon” is a good loser. Also Mr. Stratton, of Elkland, Pa., was in town this week to visit his friend, Ed Smith, on Grow Ave., who recently came here owing to the death of his father, George B. Smith. Both he and Mr. Stratton were employees of the Crandall toy factory when it was running here and went with the company when they removed to Elkland. Mr. Stratton worked for the company for 23 years until it closed up business a few years ago.

Susquehanna – The Transcript raises up to remark that, “If the average man was only as anxious to settle with his creditors as he is with his enemies, a lot of lawyers would have to close up shop and try something else.

New Milford – Saturday last was a banner day for the Sittenfeld Tanning company. On that day the company received orders amounting to $38,000. They are already far behind with their orders. By the enlargement of their beam house the capacity of the tannery has been doubled, but even at that the orders are accumulating. It is gratifying to note the success of this enterprise.

Great Bend – A local talent entertainment will be given by the Camp Fire Girls, in Williams Hall, Friday eve, Oct. 24th. The following well-known talent has been secured: Mrs. F. L. White, Arthur White, Mrs. Chas. Williams, Mrs. William Ely, Misses Cornelia Tuthill, Lula and Lena Day, James Watkins, Florence Hamlin, Mara Burk, Gladys Flynn and Master Walter Kraus. The Camp Fire Girls will present a humorous play and sing several songs. Also The large barns of Theodore and Wm. Mesick were burned on Monday afternoon, the fire originating from unknown causes. Neighbors assisted in saving a team of horses and a couple of wagons, but the flames destroyed the entire contents of hay, grain, farming implements, etc. The loss is placed at about $3,000. There was a small insurance.

Hop Bottom – G. A. Roberts, accompanied by his wife, attended the World’s base ball series in New York city last week.

Forest City – The enrollment at the end of the first week of school was 1015—the largest enrollment since the Polish school was started.

Gibson – The ladies who comprised the Kazoo Band of 1886 met for their yearly meeting with Mrs. D. B. Taft, of New Milford. A bountiful dinner was served and a very good time reported. Those present were Mrs. Mary Sweet, of Binghamton; Mrs. Lettie Sweet, of Hopbottom; Mrs. Clara Bailey, Mrs. Julia Lamb and Mrs. H. Estabrook, of Gibson.

Auburn Four Corners – A temperance speaker from Kingston, Pa. will occupy the pulpit at the M. E. church next Sunday evening.

Harford – Dr. Albert Libbals Brundage entered into his rest on September 13, 1913. He was born in Newark, N. J. in 1820; spent two years at Yale College; read medicine with Doctors William and Wheeler of Dundaff and received the degree of M. D. in 1845. He joined the Susquehanna County Medical Society in 1868 and was its President in 1883. In the spring of 1887 he settled here to spend his sunset years. An ardent disciple of Isaac Walton, he beguiled many an hour to fishing. He preached in the M. E. Church and often served acceptably in that capacity. On his 90th birthday the Medical Society tendered him a banquet and presented him a gold headed cane. Services for Dr. Brundage were held at his late residence and the remains were taken to Factoryville for burial.

Brooklyn – J. J. Austin has purchased a Maxwell car to be used in connection with his stage route between Brooklyn and Foster.

Forest Lake – Harvest Thanksgiving service in the M. E. church at Forest Lake Center on Sunday, Sept. 28, at 3 o’clock. The church will be decorated with fruits, flowers and vegetables. Special music will be furnished. The pastor will preach on the subject of “Heaven.” You are cordially invited to these services.

Tunkhannock/Montrose – Two young men drove into Tunkhannock last week with two nice looking single rigs and offered one of them at a low price. L. E. Geisinger, engineer on the Montrose branch, bought one of the horses, buggy and harness, for $125. They then drove to Montrose, where they disposed of the other outfit to Carroll Tiffany, of Franklin Forks, for $75. It later developed that they had hired the rigs from a liveryman at Williamsport. The horses were returned to the rightful owner on Monday and the purchasers are out the amount they paid for them. The horse thieves are still at large.

In 1992, there was a murder in Houston, Texas, and Genovevo Salinas was questioned by the police in connection with the shooting. Salinas was never under arrest and he voluntarily cooperated with the police in the investigation – up to the moment that they asked him if the casings at the murder scene would match the shotgun that the police found at his house. Salinas was suddenly not so talkative – like not even a peep. Salinas was later charged with the homicide – but managed to evade police for many years until he was apprehended in 2007. At the trial, the prosecutor used Salinas’ silence as evidence of his guilt. In other words, Salinas was very chatty with police up to the point when he was confronted with incriminating evidence and then he lost his voice. Salinas was convicted and received 20 years in prison.

Salinas argued that the Fifth Amendment protects his right to remain silent – and that the prosecution impermissibly used his silence as evidence of his guilt at trial. Generally speaking, a prosecutor cannot comment on a defendant’s assertion of his right to remain silent. The fact that a defendant exercises a constitutional right cannot be used as evidence of a person’s guilt – so Salinas argued that any reference to his silence was impermissible and tainted his trial.

Salinas made his way to the United States Supreme Court with his argument about the prosecution’s alleged impermissible use of his silence in his homicide trial. And the United States Supreme Court shot him down in a 5-4 vote that fell along the somewhat predictable ideological lines. Justice Alito wrote the opinion for the majority and he noted that Salinas’ “Fifth Amendment claim fails because he did not expressly invoke the privilege against self-incrimination in response to the officer’s question.” Justice Alito went further by stating that the privilege against self-incrimination is not “self-executing,” and a suspect has the obligation of affirmatively invoking it, i.e., telling the police I am done talking and invoking my right to remain silent.

Of course, this was not a situation where Salinas refused to answer any questions from the inception of the interview – he was talkative throughout the interview and simply clammed up when confronted with a difficult question. When considered in that context, he was not remaining silent – he was talking to the police – and then simply stopped at some point. Thus, the prosecution argued that there was never an assertion of the right to remain silent – he did not do so when he engaged in his interview with the police. He simply decided not to answer a particular question – and never said why he was not answering it. The Supreme Court accepted this argument and set a precedent that some pre-arrest silence can be used in a criminal prosecution provided there is no indicia that a suspect was affirmatively asserting a constitutional right by his or her silence.

The dissenting justices, led by Justice Breyer, had a far different outlook, stating that in their view “the Fifth Amendment here prohibits the prosecution from commenting on the [suspect’s] silence in response to police questioning.” The dissenting justices would have established a bright-line rule that prohibited any reference to any suspect’s refusal to answer question during the course of an interrogation.

This is an issue that arises frequently in criminal prosecutions. When a police officer is testifying to an interview with a suspect, there are often questions that a suspect simply does not answer – and those refusals to respond may be interspersed through the interview at different locations. The give and take in the interview process oftentimes involves evasive efforts by a suspect including silence. When attempting to explain to a jury what occurred during the interview, it can be particularly difficult to tiptoe around the moments of silence especially where they go to the very heart of the case. If prosecutors do not ask the police officer if he asked a critical question, then jurors are wondering why the police officer did not do his or her job. If a prosecutor asks the critical question, and the police officer responds that the defendant refused to answer that area of inquiry, the defense will argue that the defendant’s Fifth Amendment rights were violated. This recent Supreme Court decision provides a common sense approach that will provide prosecutors some leeway in presenting evidence in these scenarios.

Please submit any questions, concerns, or comments to Susquehanna County District Attorney’s Office, P.O. Box 218, Montrose, Pennsylvania 18801 or at our website www.SusquehannaCounty-DA.org or discuss this and all articles at http://dadesk.blogspot.com/.