Attacked M’Kinley’s Memory

Grand Jury Refuses to Indict the Man Who Resented It with Death Blow.

     Utica, Nov. 24.—The grand jury, which has been session [sic] at the term of the supreme court in Onedia [sic], Madison county, this week, failed to indict Estellus J. Smith of Onedia [sic], a hop merchant, who was charged with manslaughter in the second degree in having struck John La Violette, a cigarmaker, in such a manner as to cause his death from the fall which followed the blow. The affray occurred in Onedia [sic] on the evening of the death of the late President McKinley. La Violette had been heard to make remarks of a character bordering on anarchy.
     Mr. Smith heard of La Violette’s talk and his light treatment of McKinley’s death and upbraided him for his unpatriotic utterances. In a dispute which followed Smith struck La Violette, as a result of which the latter died shortly afterward. The case against Mr. Smith was pushed by the Onedia [sic] Cigarmakers’ union, but popular sympathy was with the accused man, who, it was generally believed, had done his duty in resenting the attack on the martyred president’s memory. The testimony of twenty-five witnesses was presented to the grand jury but that body refused to indict.