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Saturday, December 23, 2023

Governor Commutes Death Sentence for Jerry Dalton, Dec. 21, 1923

Local Attorney Obtains Pardon for Young Man. . . Governor Commutes Sentence of Macon County Man After Long Legal Battle

On last Saturday, December 15th, Governor Cameron Morrison announced his decision to commute the sentence of Jerry Dalton from death in the electric chair to an indeterminate sentence of from 2 to 30 years in the penitentiary, came to a definite conclusion of the longest drawn out and in many respects, one of the most dramatic cases in the courts of North Carolina for many years. Young Dalton had been tried three times and convicted of murder in the first degree three times, and three times had the governor moved up the day set for his execution, when the final decision to commute the sentence was reached. The case has been in the courts a long time. For nearly a year Dalton has been incarcerated in the death cell at Raleigh awaiting execution, and his attorneys and sympathizers have been able to stay the swift hand of the law and his execution postponed on successive occasions. Last week the final effort was made. Attorney J.N. Moody of this place spent the week in Raleigh interceding with the Governor in behalf of his client, Dalton. Many prominent women of the state, especially club women of Raleigh, interested themselves in the ca sena d also interested General Albert L. Cox, and between them, the Governor was convinced that the boy was guilty of second degree murder and so his death sentence was commuted. Mr. Moody has been Dalton’s attorney throughout the long history of the case, which dates back to 1918 when the crime was committed. The fact that he was able to obtain two new trials and to have the date of the execution stayed three times shows that he has handled the case well, and the Governor told him as much Saturday after the order commuting the sentence was made.

In 1918, in a fit of drunkenness and jealousness, Jerry Dalton, then only 21 years of age, killed his youthful sweetheart, Maud Grant, and his rival, Mearle Angel, near Aquone in Macon County. He was captured and twice tried in Macon Superior court and each time convicted of murder in the first degree. An error was found in both trials by the supreme court and while Dalton was lodged in the Buncombe Count jail on his way back from Raleigh to stand his third trial, he escaped and was not heard of any more until about a year ago when he was captured in California and sent back here for trial. Again he was convicted of first degree murder.

While in California Dalton saw in a paper that his aunt, who lived near the Mexican border, had given birth to a child, and so got in touch with her in hopes that he could hear something from his widowed mother, who lived in Andrews, this county. The aunt confided the whereabouts and the crime of Dalton to a friend and this friend made public the information in order to collect the reward. And thus Dalton was captured and brought back to North Carolina about a year ago. It seems that he has been living a useful life while in California and this, together with the fact that the act was committed in a fit of anger, led to his commuted sentence.

From the front page of The Cherokee Scout, Dec. 21, 1923

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