Circumstantial Evidence
Brief Synopsis
Cast & Crew
John Larkin
Michael O'shea
Lloyd Nolan
Trudy Marshall
Billy Cummings
Ruth Ford
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
In a small town, Joe Reynolds, a recent widower and foreman of the local plant, receives a package from Sam Lord, his best friend and the town's mailman, containing a hatchet set for Joe's beloved son Pat. Pat and his friends use the hatchet to break up wooden crates behind Kenny's Bakery, and when the disagreeable Kenny catches them, he hits Pat, takes the hatchet and calls the police. Upon learning of this, Joe storms into the bakery and begins to fight with Kenny in front of salesboy Pete Horton and customers Mrs. Simms and Mr. Bolger. The witnesses watch from the other side of the counter as Joe raises the hatchet and Kenny falls to the ground, dead. Although Joe insists that Kenny slipped and hit his head on the stove, the three accuse him of hatcheting Kenny to death, and Joe, terrified, runs to his house. There he tells Pat and Sam that he must run away for a while, but Sam, who believes that Joe's innocence will save him, turns him into the police. Joe, however, assumes Sam has set him up, and sees his suspicions reinforced at his trial, when Sam inadvertently recalls hearing Joe say that he would "bash Kenny's head in if he had to." Since the witnesses also claim to have irrefutable proof of Joe's guilt, he is sentenced to die by the electric chair. At the state penitentiary, Joe tells Pat that if only one witness changes his or her testimony during an appeal, he can be released. Pat then visits each witness and begs them to reconsider, but none will, and when Mr. Bolger calls the police to have him arrested for trespassing, Pat runs away. When Sam finds the boy with Joe's friends Marty Hannon and his pregnant wife Ann, he convinces a reluctant Pat to live with him and his wife Kate. Over the next weeks, Sam works fervently to free Joe, but the Board of Appeals will not listen to Sam's pleas. Meanwhile, Joe's fellow prisoner, Mike Mulvey, informs him of a plan in which he could take a pill to fake an illness, and when the guards brought him to the prison hospital, he could then escape through a tunnel. Although Joe initially refuses, he changes his mind after learning that his appeal has been denied. At the same time, Sam arranges a boxing match between Murray and Freddy, the sons of Judge White and Governor Hanlon, and coaches the two boys to re-stage the fight that Joe had with Kenny. At the fight, Mrs. Simms, Mr. Bolger, and Judge White insist that they saw Freddy hit Murray with a hammer, and when Murray stands up, unharmed, they all realize that they only assumed they knew what happened. This prompts them to see that the supposed evidence at Joe's trial might likewise have been circumstantial. As Joe enacts his escape plan in the prison, Judge White holds an impromptu re-trial with Sam, Freddy, Murray and the witnesses, which results in the witnesses admitting they might have been wrong. Just then, however, an escaped Joe turns up at Marty's house, where Pat and Sam convince him he must return to jail. Joe embarks on a complicated escape back into his cell, arriving just in time to meet Governor Hanlon and hear of his re-trial. Within days, Joe is found innocent, and he holds his son as he reconciles with Sam.
Director
John Larkin
Cast
Michael O'shea
Lloyd Nolan
Trudy Marshall
Billy Cummings
Ruth Ford
Reed Hadley
Roy Roberts
Scotty Beckett
Leon Tyler
Marvin Davis
Harry Mckim
Hugh Maguire
Byron Foulger
William Frambes
John Eldredge
Eddie Marr
Charles Cane
Selmer Jackson
John Hamilton
Ben Welden
Lynn Whitney
Dorothy Adams
Edward Earle
William B. Davidson
Jerry Mickelsen
Ralph Dunn
Ray Teal
Lee Phelps
Thomas Jackson
Sam Flint
George Melford
Kay Connors
John Davidson
Sherry Hall
J. Farrell Macdonald
Max Wagner
James Flavin
Eric Alden
Ken Christy
Eddie Hart
Phillip Morris
Eddie Dunn
Lee Shumway
Ted Jordan
Lester Dorr
Mel Schubert
Jimmy O'gatty
Emmett Vogan
Nolan Leary
Frank Penny
Harry Strang
Eddie Small
Lester Hoyle
Dale Cornell
Crew
David Buttolph
Norman Colbert
Sam Duncan
William Eckhardt
Nat Ferber
Curtis Fetters
William Girard
Mickey H. Golden
Richard Irvine
Harry Jackson
Harry M. Leonard
George Leverett
Thomas Little
Robert Metzler
Emil Newman
Ben Nye
Samuel Ortiz
Fred J. Root
Fred Sersen
Vinton Vernon
Lyle Wheeler
Yvonne Wood
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
A written prologue states that circumstantial evidence is very dangerous and can lead to the conviction of innocent people. Although a September 1944 Hollywood Reporter news item announced that Preston Foster was to star in the picture, he did not appear in the final film.
