Grand Jury Indicts Lizzie Borden

• Author: Allen Pusey
• Pages: 72-72

PHOTOS BY FRANCK FOTOS/PICTORIAL PRESS LTD/THE HISTORY COLLECTION/WALTER OLEKSY/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO

In November 1892, Fall River, Massachusetts, was an un remarkable New England mill town with a very rema rk-

able problem: What to do with Lizzie Borden?

Late in the morning of Aug. 4, t he body of

Andrew Jackson Borden, a prom inent local

banker and mill ma nager, was found hacked

to death in the parlor of his house at 92

Second St. Perhaps a half-hour later, the bod y

of Abby Borden, his second wi fe and Lizzie’s

stepmother, was found in a very sim ilar condi-

tion in an upstair s guest room.

At fi rst, police suspecte d a Portuguese

laborer turned away ea rlier by Andrew Borden

unpaid for some work at the house. But the more they spoke

with the 32-year- old Lizzie, the more the police came to sus -

pect an answer c loser to the Borden household. It had been

Lizzie who had di scovered her father’s body and sounded the

alarm to housekee per Bridget Sullivan, who had been wa sh-

ing windows that morni ng. It was Sullivan, along with a

neighbor, who found Abby’s bloodied body upstair s.

Although the murders had e vidently occurred over a span

of 90 minutes, neither woman cla imed to have seen or heard

anything unusu al. The problem was that there was scant

physical evidence li nking anyone to the spectacu larly bloody

murders, and police suspicions hi nged on a string of circum-

stances glea ned from Lizzie’s sometimes-vary ing accounts.

Even worse, Lizzie’s account s seemed suspiciously detached,

as when she correcte d an investigator who inquired about

her relationship with her mother: “She is not my mot her,”

Lizzie interrupted. “She is my stepmother.”

At the coroner’s inque st, actual ev idence con-

tinued to be elusive, but so was L izzie’s tes-

timony: Her answers were short a nd often

argumentative . She hadn’t realized her

father had retur ned from an errand.

When he did, she must have been in

the barn search ing for fi shing sinker s.

After fi nding his body, it never occu rred

to her that her stepmother might be in

danger. Abby had left, Lizzie t hought,

summoned by a mysterious note .

But there was no note. Abby was

still at home with 19 h atchet-like wounds in

the back of her head. And on Aug. 11, one week

after the murders, L izzie Borden was arreste d.

But the lack of physical ev idence (or even

an obvious motive) plagued prosecut ors, and

by the time a Bristol Count y grand jury was

empaneled Nov. 7, the case seemed in limbo.

Shortly before the gra nd jury was scheduled to

deliver its report, neighbor A lice Russell shared

a story she hadn’t prev iously told investigators.

Two days before their murders, Abby and Andr ew Borden

su ered severe stomach cramps, and Abby su spected poi-

son. The night before the murders, Li zzie had acknowledged

that possibility, telli ng Russell she feared another, more vio-

lent attack from some of her father ’s business asso ciates.

More damning, Russell t estifi ed she ha d encountered Lizzie

in the Borden kitchen thre e days after the murders burning

pieces of a blue corduroy skirt she cl aimed had been ruined

by paint. The grand jur y had heard enough, and on Dec. 2,

1892, Lizzie was indic ted for murdering her father with “10

mortal wou nds” to his head.

But at her trial in New Bedford for t he killings the follow-

ing June, the lack of physical ev idence continued to haunt

the prosecution. Lizz ie’s lawyer, George Robinson, was an

experienced tr ial attorney and a former governor of Massa -

chusetts. Robinson’s methodical cro ss-examinat ions under-

mined the circum stantial case agai nst her. Her detachment

was attribute d to morphine sedation by the family doct or.

The skirt-burn ing was dismissed by its obviousnes s and

boldness. And on June 20, 1893—absent motive, serious

blood evidence or even a weapon—the all-ma le jury

acquitted her. Though it seemed no one else cou ld

have done it, many considered the outcome a

remarkable exercise in t he rule of law.

After her tr ial, Lizzie Borden continued

her life in Fall River w ithout controversy

until her death at age 67. She was buried

in the family plot, a djacent to her father,

mother and, of cou rse, her stepmother.

72

|| ABA JOURNAL DECEMBER 2018

A Grand Jury Indicts Lizzie Borden

Precedents || By Allen Pusey

Lizzie Borden (cen ter) and the all-

male trial jury who acquitted her.

The Borden home i s now a museum and be d-and-b reakfast.

Dec. 2, 1892

Victims Andrew an d Abby Borden