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Beyond the Byline: Preserve our history, our memories

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Event offers of plenty of fun in Lehman Township

Convicted of killing his common law wife inside Wilkes-Barre City Hall&rsquo;s first floor office of Police Chief Grant Long on Aug. 20, 1909, George L. Marion, 42, came within 24 hours of being executed by hanging.
				&ldquo;Yesterday was the day set for his execution and he was saved from the hangman&rsquo;s noose by the Board of Pardons,&rdquo; a state agency that commuted Marion&rsquo;s death sentence to life in prison, reported the Times Leader on Oct. 3, 1911.
				Marion arrived in Wilkes-Barre on a Lehigh Valley passenger train from New York City shortly after 7 p.m. on Aug. 20, 1909, and taken to city hall by a police clerk to meet up with his common law wife, Francis Lee Browles, inside the police chief&rsquo;s office.
				Long and Marion had sent telegraphs to each other after Marion discovered Browles and his 4-year-old son left with another man and were in Wilkes-Barre. Marion told Long that Browles and the child were kidnapped.
				A week earlier, Browles and the child appeared at Long&rsquo;s office begging for help. Long assisted Browles in securing a room at the Hart Hotel on East Market Street where she obtained a job as a waitress.
				After Marion arrived at city hall, he asked to speak with Browles alone.
				Long got up and walked out closing the door behind him. Then he heard gunshots.
				&ldquo;The most sensational murder that has occurred in Wilkes-Barre in many years took place in the office of chief of police Long in City Hall shortly after 9 p.m.,&rdquo; the Times Leader reported.
				Marion&rsquo;s trial began at the Luzerne County Courthouse on Jan. 16, 1909, before Judge John Lynch in Courtroom One.
				Attorneys Edwin Morgan and Charles B. Lenahan defended Marion on an insanity defense.
				District Attorney John H. Williams, who won the seat in the November 1909 election, prosecuted.
				During the trial, jurors were told Francis Browles lived with Marion for seven years before she left him and eloped Richard Brooks in Stroudsburg. The newly married couple arrived in Scranton and traveled by train to Wilkes-Barre where Robert Brooks abandoned Browles and her child at the Jersey Central Train Station on East Market Street.
				According to the Times Leader story published Jan. 19, 1910, Long testified he took Marion to his office to meet with Browles.
				&ldquo;When he saw her, he said to her, &lsquo;Why did you do this, you know I love you. I have a good position now making $50 a week and I want to take you and the baby back to New York,&rsquo;&rdquo; Long told the jury as reported in the Times Leader.
				Marion was a booking agent and an actor for a theater in New York City at the time of the fatal shooting.
				Long left the couple alone and walked to another office. After 90 seconds, Long turned to return to his office when he told jurors he heard two gunshots.
				&ldquo;When I got in I found Marion standing up with the smoking revolver in his hand pointed at the woman who lay on the floor at his feet. I rushed at him and grabbed him by the throat with one hand while I reached for the revolver with the other,&rdquo; Long testified.
				After Marion was placed in a holding cell, he confessed to the fatal shooting to newspaper reporters.
				Those reporters, including Times Leader reporter John R. Mooney, were called to testify during the trial.
				The jury deliberated for less than one hour finding Marion guilty of first-degree murder. The verdict was announced at 2 p.m. on Jan. 16, 1910.
				&ldquo;Marion was deathly pale when the verdict was announced. He had expected acquittal and was gravely disappointed and unnerved,&rdquo; the Times Leader reported.
				Two days after Marion was convicted of murder, he attempted to take his own life by cutting his wrist with a knife he hidden inside his cell for several weeks, the Times Leader reported Jan. 29, 1910.
				&ldquo;The officials at the county jail tried to keep the news quiet but it leaked out last evening,&rdquo; the story reported.
				After a year-long appeal, Marion was sentenced to die by hanging on March 4, 1911. The state Board of Pardons commuted the death sentence to life in prison on Oct. 2, 1911.
				Marion&rsquo;s luck continued when the Board of Pardons pardoned his life sentence in July 1918, releasing him from the Eastern Penitentiary.
				Marion returned to New York City and acted in a stage play where he played the role of a district attorney prosecuting a man who killed his wife, the Wilkes-Barre Record newspaper reported March 1, 1920.

Look Back: Woman fatally shot inside police chief’s office in 1909