City Councilman Jesse Roach and Policeman Milton Ellis in Court

Creator

Preview

Identifier

20124390

Description

Roach's Radar Speed Trail Creeping Along City Councilman Jesse Roach's trial in Corporation Court Wednesday morning was moving at a considerably slower pace than the 41 miles he is accused of speeding in a 30-mile-an-hour zone on Riverside Drive. Moving so slowly, for that matter, that Oliver W. Fannin Sr., who is sitting on the case in place of Corporation Court Judge Gilmartin, who had disqualified himself, was impelled to tell Roach's attorney, Brantley Pringle, to hurry up "or we'll be here all week." Radar, its merits and demerits, was the subject on which Pringle dwelt through the morning. The attorney, who already has won one case against radar in the count's courts, came into Corporation Court with a look of solemn determination on his face. Then he kept one policeman on his feet an hour and 15 minutes to question him about the ticket given Roach in the 1300 block of Riverside Drive on November 6th. Witnesses are not seated while testifying in Corporation Court. The long-standing policeman, Milton Ellis, who gave Roach the ticket. Ellis and Policeman Walter Davis, who testified for 25 minutes, are partners with a radar unit. Roach, who after getting the ticket claimed that police were "haunting" his pink Cadillac, shook hands with the officers when he entered the courtroom. Wednesday morning, Roach's bright car was represented by a model of a green Ford. When the court was shown the positions of the vehicle at the time it was clocked. Another witness during the morning, S. Ledbetter, manager of Roach's new cafe in Dallas, said he was riding with Roach when the city councilman was ticketed and that there were other cars on the street at the time. Pringle is contending that the radar unit clocked a car other than Roach's. During his testimony, Ellis said no other cars were in the radar's range. When the trial started, Gilmartin moved his other cases to another room in the building, leaving the room for Fannin.

Archival Date

1958-12-17

Collection Name

Fort Worth Star-Telegram Collection

Collection Number

AR406-6-179

Original Format

Negatives, Black & White

File Format

JPG

Rights

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License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Subjects

Corporation Court; Trials