Name: The Public Defender
Released: 1917
Cast: Frank Keenan, Alma Hanlon, Robert Edeson, John Sainpolis, Florence Short

Brief Synopsis

Cast & Crew

Film Details

Release Date

Jan 1917

Premiere Information

not available

Production Company

Harry Raver, Inc.

Distribution Company

State Rights

Country

United States

Screenplay Information

Based on the book The Public Defender by Mayer C. Goldman (New York, 1917).

Synopsis

When bank president Leslie Morrison dips into the till, he seeks to place the blame on bank clerk David Moulton by altering the figures in Moulton's books. He lays his plan carefully, but upon leaving the building late one night, Morrison falls into an elevator shaft and is killed. Moulton, the one man known to have been there, is charged with murder and tried by district attorney Robert Murdock. Unable to afford a competent defense, Moulton is convicted and sentenced to die in an electric chair. However, Mary Reed, a stenographer who loves Moulton, appeals as a last resort to the newly elected public defender, Arthur Nelson. Nelson investigates the case and discovers evidence on the very eve of the execution, evidence that will warrant a stay. Rescued from death in the nick of time, Moulton is granted a new trial under the supervision of the public defender and is found innocent.