Sacco and Vanzetti - Second Appeal To The Supreme Judicial Court

Second Appeal To The Supreme Judicial Court

The defense promptly appealed once more to the Supreme Judicial Court and presented their arguments on January 27–28, 1927. While the appeal was under consideration, Harvard law professor and future Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter published an article in the Atlantic Monthly arguing for a retrial. He noted that the SJC had already taken a very narrow view of its authority when considering the first appeal and called upon the court to review the entire record of the case. He called their attention to Thayer's lengthy statement that accompanied his denial of the Madeiros appeal, describing it as "a farrago of misquotations, misrepresentations, suppressions, and mutilations," "honeycombed with demonstrable errors."

At the same time, Major Calvin Goddard, a ballistics expert who had helped pioneer the use of the comparison microscope in forensic ballistic research, offered to conduct an independent examination of the forensic gun and bullet evidence using techniques he had developed for use with the comparison microscope. Goddard first offered to conduct a new forensic examination for the defense, which rejected it, and then to the prosecution, which accepted Goddard's offer. Using the comparison microscope, Goddard compared Bullet III and a .32 Auto shell casing found at the South Braintree shooting with that of several .32 Auto test cartridges fired from Sacco's .32 Colt automatic pistol. Goddard concluded that not only did Bullet III match the rifling marks found on the barrel of Sacco's .32 Colt pistol, but that scratches made by the firing pin of Sacco's .32 Colt on the primers of spent shell casings test-fired from Sacco's Colt matched those found on the primer of a spent shell casing recovered at the South Braintree murder scene. More sophisticated comparative examinations in 1935, 1961, and 1983 each reconfirmed the opinion that the bullet the prosecution said killed Berardelli, and one of the cartridge cases introduced into evidence were fired in Sacco's .32 Colt automatic. (Defenders of Sacco and Vanzetti have long claimed that "Bullet III" and the associated cartridge case were planted by the police, in order to frame the two defendants).

The Supreme Judicial Court denied the Madeiros appeal on April 5, 1927. Summarizing the decision, the New York Times said that the SJC had determined that "the judge had a right to rule as he did" but that the SJC "did not deny the validity of the new evidence." The SJC also said: "It is not imperative that a new trial be granted even though evidence is newly discovered and, if presented to a jury, would justify a different verdict."