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bear to defeat a conviction if he be really guilty - and if not guilty he ought not to be punished. It dont seem to us that if all cases in which a freedman may be concerned is tried by a military commission there would be such an accumulation of business that it would take at least twenty commissions to dispose of the criminal business of this state. and the sittings of the commissions are so far distant in many instances that, the procuring of witnesses both for the prosecution and defence would be both expensive and exceedingly tardy.
This offence if committed at all, was committed on the line of this and Washington Counties and by our Statutes he can be tried in either County, and as he is now in the County of Fayette we ask that he be turned over to the sheriff of Fayette County and placed in jail until the Court sits in La Grange in the fall now a few months off. Mr Priestly is charged with a very heinous offence, the penalty if found guilty may be confinement in the penitentiary or may be death and we hope you will give this case such consideration as its importance may demand - Moore x Ledbetter Attys &c