This is Part 5 of a Moral Quandary. Click here to read Part 1.
In his dim cell, Caruso was largely unaware of public sentiment and efforts to save him. His thoughts were quite different. He said, “I hope they show me how to read and write before they kill me.”
“Doctor give Joey medicine and Joey die,” he muttered. “I get crazy, kill doctor, and scare everybody. Now people say medicine no kill Joey. Maybe I understand more good if I see things on paper.” If he had been able to read, he would have known better. He recalled his own feeble interventions when Joey got sick. Someone told him that putting a piece of lettuce on the child’s neck would cure him.
Despite the opinions of the public, the clerical condemnation, and the tears and prayers of Maria Caruso could not prevent Francesco Caruso being sentenced. On April 18, Judge McLaughlin sentenced him to die in the electric chair the week of June 6th. Further, Caruso must leave the city at 11:35 that very day to await his execution at Sing Sing.
Caruso probably believed things were as bad as they could ever be when he boarded the train for Sing Sing.
Maria and her children moved in with her father in a tiny 2-bedroom apartment in Grantwood, New Jersey to wait for a miracle. A miracle was forthcoming but more tragedy would visit the family first.
Readers could scarcely believe their eyes when they read a report about the Carusos a few days after Francesco was moved to the death house in Sing Sing. “Tragedy visited Mrs. Francesco Caruso again yesterday. The impoverished wife of the condemned slayer of Dr. Casper Pendola lost her 4-month-old daughter Ida in death…Warden Lawes announced today that whereas time-serving prisoners are permitted to leave the prison under guard, when relatives died, inmates of the death house must stay there until they are executed or an appeal is won.”
Ida’s cause of death wasn’t mentioned but the sorrow threatened to crush Maria Caruso. Losing two children and her husband in three months was too much. She was unable to go to the funeral.
The first ray of light to pierce the gloom came from the people of New York and New Jersey. Their sympathy and generosity caused them to establish a Caruso Defense Committee with three aims: to pay for the baby’s funeral, to offer immediate and permanent financial relief to Mrs. Caruso and the children, and to secure Caruso’s release.
Next came the news that George Voss, Caruso’s attorney, had filed an appeal. This automatically stayed his execution. The nationwide interest in Caruso’s case caught the attention of famed Chicago attorney Clarence Darrow, who announced he would work with George Voss to defend Francesco free of charge before the state Court of Appeals in October.
Francesco’s brother Rosario traveled to Sing Sing to visit his brother in the death house and tell him the good news. Caruso was elated. It seemed the pledges of financial support from his family meant even more to him than the news that Darrow would be involved in his appeal. “Good things are happening at last,” he told Rosario.
old spirituals 