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| Sunday, 30 October 2005 |
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Features |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
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Famous Trials that shook
the world :
The trial of Roscoe Arbuckle by Lionel Wijesiri
Roscoe Arbuckle (March 24, 1887 - June 29, 1933) was an American silent film comedian. He was given the nickname 'Fatty' because of his rotund figure. Arbuckle was one of the most popular actors of his era, but is best known for his central role in the so-called 'Fatty Arbuckle scandal' and the subsequent trial. In 1913, at the age of 26, Arbuckle hit the big time when he signed with Mack Sennett's Keystone Film Company and became a star in the Keystone kops comedies. Eventually he started in a series of short comedy films that won him acclaim and fortune around the world; at the height of his popularity, he was outshone only by Charlie Chaplin. Arbuckle was heavy - he weighed somewhere between 250 and 300 pounds and that was part of his comedy. He moved gracefully, threw pies, and humorously tumbled. In 1921, Arbuckle signed a three-year contract with Paramount for $ 1 million - an unheard of amount at the time, even in Hollywood. To celebrate his new contract, Arbuckle and two of his friends drove up from Los Angeles to San Francisco on Saturday, September 3, 1921 for a weekend revelry. They checked into the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco. The three decided to have a party and invited several known women to their suite. One woman - Maude Delmont brought in a companion known as Virginia Rappe. The party started early and though this was during prohibition, large quantities of liquor were being available. Around 3 o'clock, Arbuckle retired from the party in order to get dressed to go sight-seeing with a friend. What happened in the next ten minutes is disputed. Maude Delmont, later made a statement to the police. She claimed that Arbuckle herded 26 year-old Virginia Rappe into his bedroom and said, "I've waited for this a long time." Delmont said that a few minutes later she could hear screams from Rappe coming from the bedroom. Delmont claimed she tried to open the door, even kick it in , but couldn't get it open. When Arbuckle opened the door, supposedly Rappe was found naked and bleeding behind him. Before making the statement, Delmont tried to blackmail Arbuckle over his involvement in the matter. Arbuckle, confident he had nothing to be ashamed of, refused to be intimidated. Arbuckle in his statement said that when he retired to his room to change clothes, he found Rappe vomiting in his bathroom. He then helped clean her up and led her to a nearby bed to rest. Thinking she was just overly intoxicated, he left her to rejoin the party. When he returned to the room just a few minutes later, he found Rappe on the floor. After putting her back on the bed, he left the room to get help. When others entered the room, they found Rappe tearing at her clothes (something that has been claimed she did often when she was drunk). Party guests tried a number of treatments, including covering Rappe with ice, but she still wasn't getting any better. The hotel staff were contacted and Rappe was taken to another room to rest. With others looking after Rappe, Arbuckle left for the sight-seeing tour and then drove back Los Angeles. Three days later. Rappe was taken to the Hospital as she didn't improve. She died the following day from peritonitis, caused by a ruptured bladder. Arbuckle was soon arrested and charged with the murder of Virginia Rappe. Matthew Barady, the politically ambitious district attorney, quickly pursued charges against Arbuckle, releasing a statement to the press that essentially accused Arbuckle of raping or attempting to rape Rappe. However, the doctor who conducted the autopsy on Rappe found no evidence that violence has played any role in her death, nor did he find any evidence that she had been sexually assaulted. The papers went wild with this story. In the newspapers, Arbuckle was assumed guilty and Virginia Rappe was an innocent young girl. The papers excluded reporting that Rappe had a history of numerous abortions, with some evidence starting she might have had another a short time before the party. The public reaction to Arbuckle was fierce. Perhaps even more than the specific charges of rape and murder, Arbuckle became a symbol of Hollywood's immorality. Movie houses across the country almost immediately stopped showing Arbuckle's movies. Arbuckle was perhaps the most famous American ever tried for murder until O. J. Simpson some seventy-five years later. By the time of the trial, actual evidence in the prosecution's case had become comically thin. The original complainant, Maude Delmont, was considered too unreliable to be called as a witness, and others whose affidavits were taken were hardly damning evidence. But public opinion of Arbuckle had been poisoned by negative media exposure. Press coverage of the Arbuckle case became more sensational by the day. The first two trials each ended in a hung jury. For the third trial, the charge against Arbuckle was reduced from murder to manslaughter. The jury acquitted him after less than half an hour's deliberation and added a special statement to the verdict insisting that acquitted was not enough to demonstrate the baselessness of the charges against him. Acquittal is not enough for Roscoe Arbuckle. We feel that a great injustice has been done him. We feel also that it was our only plan to him this exoneration. There was not slightest proof adduced to connect him in any way with the commission of crime. He was mainly throughout the case and told a straightforward story on the witness stand, which we all believed. We wish him success and hope that the American people will take the judgement of fourteen men and women who have sat listening for thirty-one days to the evidence that Roscoe Arbuckle is entirely innocent and free from all blame. Although Arbukcle was cleared of the allegations, the resulting infamy destroyed his career and his personal life. During the trial, morality groups nationwide called for Arbuckcle to be sentenced to death, and studio moguls ordered Arbuckle's friends in the industry not to come to his public defence. Arbuckle tried to return to moviemaking, but audiences shunned him and he retreated into alcoholism. Roscoe Arbuckle died from heart failure on June 29, 1933 in New York City. Buster Keaton, his most closest friend, stated repeatedly that Arbuckle died of a broken heart. |
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