JUDY AND GUBI' ON TRIAL
BOHN, WILLIAM E.
'Judy and Gubi' on Trial Guilt Clearly Established in Trial for Conspiracy By WILLIAM E. BONN FOR MORE THAN A YEAR five trials concerning Communist activity have occupied an important place...
...She has ambitions to write a novel—so she penned sketches of fellow employees, exactly the sort of sketches which would be useful to the chief of a Russian apparatus to perfect his American staff...
...They are supposed to have met by chance at the Modern Art Museum and to have been quickly seized by a romantic fascination—and the gyrations about Washington Heights on cold winter nights are said to have resulted...
...The third stated that Gubitchev attempted, as an unauthorized person, to receive classified matter...
...But this she was careful not to do...
...They probably thought that counts two and four cover practically the same ground, so there was no point in pronouncing Miss Coplon guilty under both of them...
...But how criminal could such conduct be...
...All of the decisions have been or are being appealed...
...AFTER MANY DAYS in court this past year, I have developed a good deal of respect for the judges and prosecuting attorneys...
...Obviously Russian undercover workers would seek connections with this department...
...They began with the ease of the eleven Communist party leaders...
...But when they were arrested Miss Coplon had in her bag a fat treasure trove of documents, notes and records...
...This set .of circumstances naturally inade many courtroom auditors think That the Government had a rather poor case...
...Both Alger Hiss and Judith Coplon took papers from government files to which they had access and gave them— or intended to give them—to agents of the Russian Government...
...The four counts of the indictment did not charge Miss Coplon with passing government documents or Gubitchev with receiving such documents...
...Gubitchev lived not very far up, on the West Side...
...Coplon and Gubitchev were later followed on a rather wild chase all the way from Washington Heights to Third Avenue between East 15th and East 16th Streets...
...As for Gubitchev, it appeared that he had not been connected with improper activity of any sort...
...When I read that Jjidge Ryun and the State Department had come to an agreement in accordance with which the diminutive defendant was to huvt...
...The first count charged both defendants with conspiring to commit espionage...
...On cold winter nights — it was usually after six o'clock when the young lady reached her trysting place— she would stand about, go up this street and down that one, and finally have a few seconds or minutes with the diminutive Bolshevik...
...This may be indiscreet for a Russian, but could it be considered criminal...
...ANYONE WHO even briefly considers the whole record of this case must reach the conclusion that the defendants were guilty...
...The theory upon which the defense asked the jury to interpret this series of actions is that these young people were in love...
...But in the case of Judith Coplon and Valentin Gubitchev there are some rather special features which lead to confusion...
...The defense made the best use it could of the fact that the FBI had destroyed its records of its early wiretapping activities...
...But it was obviously during this preliminary snooping that Federal Bureau agents learned about the young lady's projected journeys to New York...
...The tale of their collaboration sounds like a very long and rather dull comedy of errors...
...When a government employee from a department that deals with highly secret matters meets a Russian in this peculiarly devious and suspicious manner, we are justified in thinking that there is something more involved than a desire to pass the time of day...
...I am sure that the oldest woman on the jury could recall enough about love to decide that it would not lead its two victims to meet for a flashing minute on u windy street corner and then part...
...The only serious criticism which one can level at the federal courts in connection with these trials is that the judges allowed the defense too much leeway...
...So when she took the train the FBI men were never far away, and when she landed in New York other FBI agents were with her every step of her devious way...
...Judy and Gubi' on Trial Guilt Clearly Established in Trial for Conspiracy By WILLIAM E. BONN FOR MORE THAN A YEAR five trials concerning Communist activity have occupied an important place in the minds ot Americans...
...next the trial of Judith Coplon alone...
...The man whom she was meeting was a member of the Moscow foreign office and an engineer attached to the Planning Division of the United Nation.% They did not meet as normal and innocent persons do...
...The various moves made after this first announcement were obviously the result of a debate which went on within the various centers of Bolshevik authority...
...In each instance the evidence was convincing and the defendants found guilty...
...Each one has said to the jury: "Here are tha facts...
...Miss Coplon landed at Pennsylvania station...
...and lastly, the case of Coplon and Gubitchev...
...Inevitably, the people of this country will contrast what happened in Foley Square with what took place in Sofia, where Michael Shipkov was tried for his life...
...we shall be rid of him and the American Communists will not have another martyr to rally round...
...Her telephone was tapped and a microphone concealed in her office...
...By crossing town on a 14th Street subway they briefly eluded their pursuers, and for fifteen minutes they were entirely alone...
...DOWN TO THEIR LAST MOVE, Gubitchev and his attorney followed the regular pattern of Communist behavior...
...True, it was proved that an employee of the Department of Justice was gyrating about New York with government papers in her pocket...
...It was here, of course, where information about Russian espionage would be noted first and acted against...
...The second accused Miss Coplon of attempting to transmit classified material...
...if Judith Coplon actually were innocent, she could have introduced an entirely different defense...
...The last four of these trials have involved disloyalty in connection with the theft and transfer or attempted transfer of government documents...
...On each occasion Miss Coplon made her way to the neighborhood of 193rd Street and Broadway in the Washington Heights section of New York...
...then came the first Alger Hiss trial...
...Each time she was observed—"surveiled," as they elegantly put it in court—by the FBI...
...She could have taken the stand herself...
...The judges in both Coplon trials ruled that since it was obtained illegally this material could not be introduced in court...
...But no matter what the ultimate outcome, wc have gained sufficient experience to reach some conclusions regarding the effectiveness of the federal courts in dealing with the Communist threat...
...Three times they went through an elaborate set of actions...
...The young lady in question is a dark, little, piquant-faced graduate of Barnard College, the sort of girl whom no one would take for a criminal and who would instantly appeal to the protective impulses of any man...
...Some Communists thought Gubitchev could do most good in an American jail...
...I wish that those who talk so glibly about "hysteria" could have attended these trials...
...So, before this article reaches the eyes of its readers, the little man will be out on the Atlantic...
...Three times Miss Coplon, with government documents in her bag, met this Russian in a peculiar way at a peculiar place...
...THE EVIDENCE, considered in relation to the four counts of the indictments, proves more than such an outline suggests...
...The jury pronounced the defendants guilty on all counts except the second...
...If there be hysteria, 11 is to be found elsewhere...
...ALGER HISS' GUILT was clearly proved and public opinion about it seems to be well in accord with the facts brought out in court...
...The fourth count charged Miss Coplon with having attempted to transfer documents relating to national defense to a citizen of a foreign country...
...Miss Coplon was a political analyst in the Internal Security and Foreign Agents Registration section of the Department of Justice...
...Gubitchev, however, had upon his person nothing which he had not a perfect right to possess...
...It Is to be hoped that when he arrives in Moscow he will write ad article giving his impressions of American courts...
...his sentence suspended on condition that he would immediately sail for the Communist fatherland, I said to myself: "That is fine...
...then the second Hiss trial...
...Three times Miss Coplon made trips up from Washington: on January 14, February 18, and March 4, 1949...
...In fact, while Archibald Palmer acted as Miss Coplon's attorney he was allowed to fill many hours of precious time with foolish and useless questions...
...Early in January 1949, one of Miss Coplon's associates became^ suspicious of her...
...The prosecutors, McGohey, Murphy and Kelley, have all been especially restrained, sober, factual...
...If isolation had any charms for them, those few moments must have been precious and one would have expected them to make good use of them...
...he had merely been meeting and walking about with a government girl...
...But-if this be failure, it jfl failure on the right side...
...Furthermore, this little girl and the equally little and helpless-looking Russian, Gubitchev, apparently accomplished nothing in the way of transferring documents or injuring the United States...
...The New York trial lasted from January 24 to March 7. The defense attorneys had every chance that they could ask...
...But they came together away uptown in the neigborhood of 193rd Street...
...Some thought his liberation represented u victory for the U.S.S.R...
...What information was gleaned from these sources we never ^earned...
...Miss Coplon's reputed interest in writing was introduced as a subsidiary explanation...
...and he should, therefore, bo allowed to depart...
...She could have displayed her whole life and character l>eforc the jury...
...The Sofia ceremony occupied two days, days packed with emotion, pressure, all the signs of compulsion...
...But the crowd of witnesses who almost always had them in view never saw one piece of paper pass between them...
...look at them and draw your own conclusions...
Vol. 33 • March 1950 • No. 12
