J.A. Graves My Seventy Years in California, Los Angeles: The Times-Mirror Press, 1927, 478 pp.
[p. 275] Chapter XXXIV People Vs. Wong Chew Shut
I never had much experience with criminal cases. One, that of Wong Chew Shut, satisfied me . . .
. . .
[p. 279] Two other cases, those of the People vs. Waller and the People vs. Parker, were both tried by Brunson and Eastman, the first in the latter part of January, 1878, and the latter in March of the same year, and are worth mentioning.
Baker and Jones owned all the land at Santa Monica, down to low-water mark. People were continually squatting upon this land. Wallace was the keeper of the company’s bath-house. A carpenter, named Fonck, an excitable German, started to erect a bath-house just north of the company’s bath-house, for Mrs. Doria Jones, of this city. Waller, who, at this time, was standing on the porch of the bath-house, ordered Fonck off. Fonck threatened Waller with his hammer and swore at him vigorously. A son of Waller’s, who was shooting sandpipers on the beach with a muzzle-loading shotgun, loaded with pieces of lead-pipe, cut into slugs, instead of shot, was passing. Waller called to him and he passed the gun to his father. Fonck was still abusing Waller and threatening him with the hammer. Waller cocked the gun. He had had a felon on his thumb and had lost the bone in the last joint of it. As Fonck had quieted down and agreed to remove the timber from the lot, Waller attempted to let down the hammer of the gun. His thumb, minus the bone in the last joint, would not hold the hammer. The gun was discharged, hitting Fonck in the ankle and breaking the bone. His companions carried him up the bluff, to a grocery store. A sack of meal was cut [p. 280] open, the bleeding ankle thrust into it and more meal poured over it, while a man hustled off on horseback to Los Angeles, to get Dr. Joseph Kurtz. Necessarily, some hours elapsed before the doctor arrived. In the meantime, the meal had stopped the flow of blood and Fonck was resting comfortably. All hands, including the injured man, drank considerable beer. After a time some one suggested that they hose off the meal and see how the leg was getting along. They carried Fonck to a grass-plot, turned the hose on the injured limb, a severe hemorrhage set in, and just before Dr. Kurtz arrived, Fronck died from loss of blood.
Both Waller and Parker, who was the superintendent of the Santa Monica Land Company which owned the bath-house, were indicted. Waller was tried, told his story to the jury and was convicted of involuntary manslaughter, and imprisoned for one year in the state prison. Each of the jurors signed a petition to the court asking leniency for the defendent. During the trial, and before the grand jury which indicted the defendants, a witness named Suits swore he had heard Parker tell Waller to keep people off the beach if he had to do it with a shotgun. After the Waller trial, Eastman persuaded Suits to take a trip to Lower California, so as not to be here when Parker was tried. The trial was postponed on account of Suits' absence, and Suits did not stay there as long as he was expected to. Col. Baker and Eastman were indicted for conspiracy. They both plead guilty and Eastman made an eloquent plea for the exoneration of Baker and took the blame upon himself. Eastman was fined $1,000 and Col. Baker $600, both of which were paid.
Parker’s case was heard on March 1st, 1878. The newspapers made a great outcry over the matter, denouncing the Santa Monica Land Company, Jones, Baker, and the firm of Brunson & Eastman, and the public was greatly excited. Parker was not within three miles of the beach when Fonck was shot. He was convicted of murder in the second degree. There never was a greater legal outrage perpetrated by a jury. If Parker was guilty of murder in the second degree, Waller should undoubtedly have been hung. If Waller was only guilty of involuntary manslaughter, Parker was never guilty of anything.
(See 1878)