Author: June Morrall

Murder in Montara: The Babes in the Woods Case 1946; Part V

There was a lot of back-and-forth over where Vorhes Newton’s arraignment would take place in the summer of 1946. Who knows how they finally worked it out but those officials who pushed the Redwood City County Courthouse venue, lost, and it was decided the 24-year-old Newton would be arraigned on the Coastside where his horrific crime had been committed.

Half Moon Bay was a rural country village, and Judge Manuel Bettencourt, who presided over the court there, was the kind of man you either liked or hated, He was called “The Judgeâ€? and depending on who was saying it, “The Judgeâ€? sounded warm and friendly or tainted with a smoldering ire.

One thing nobody could deny, “The Judgeâ€? had broken social barriers by marrying the pert, outgoing Irene Debenedetti, the daughter of one of the most prominent families in town. She was Italian; he was Portuguese; theirs may have been the first such important marital union in Spanishtown, as the “realâ€? locals called Half Moon Bay.

It was only an arraignment, a legal procedure measured in minutes, but no matter how small his role “the Judgeâ€? would be a presence.

Judge Bettencourt’s office/courtroom stood on Main Street, across the way from today’s “Original Johnny’sâ€? coffee shop. Bettencourt’s courtroom was a space big enough to hold a maximum of 25 spectators.

Dubbed the “Babes in the Woodsâ€? case by the press, Vorhes Newton had attracted national attention putting Redwood City, where the heavy legal business was conducted, on the map. This case could make reputations.

Due to all the attention, Judge Bettencourt’s Half Moon Bay courtroom couldn’t comfortably accommodate all the photographers, reporters, the curious, the locals and the participants. Sheriff’s deputies, with their prisoner, had to push through the crowd before a decision was made to move the whole show to the nearby high school’s gymnasium, accommodating 150 spectators. When the bleachers were full, chairs were quickly brought in and a courtroom improvised with tables from the classrooms.

Sheriff Walter Moore, member of a prominent Pescadero family, acted as bailiff. County District Attorney Gilbert Ferrell arrived with Fred Wyckoff, Ferrell’s second-in-command who had done most of the early case work.

The noise of onlookers didn’t drown out official voices in the makeshift courtroom in the school gym– rather there was a stunned quiet– and, besides the normal curiosity associated with people wanting to see the kind of man who would murder his own children–there was pity for young Vorhes Newton.

Wearing a checkered sports jacket and brown tie, Vorhes had a scrubby brown beard, his face was bruised, his black eye colored a purplish hue now. His own personal trial had caused his shoulders to droop. When his eyes searched the school gym, he recognized half a dozen members of his family but Vorhes didn’t smile or nod at them. He still couldn’t believe he committed the murders.

Judge Bettencourt asked the defendant if Vorhes Newton was his name and he softly answered, “Yesâ€?.

Then followed a series of damning witnesses First was Fred Simmons, Half Moon Bay’s deputy sheriff. He spoke of bringing a bloodied Lorraine Newton to the Community Hospital. He told of finding the bodies of the two little ones.

John Kyne testified to finding the bodies of the two babies at the Montara flower ranch which was also confirmed by Kyne’s employees James Fiedler and Steve Torre,.

Mrs. Dodd, the Newton’s Alameda neighbor, told the court that she accompanied the Newton family on the first part of the murder ride. She was dropped off at the Alameda navy base. Later that day she saw Vorhes return home alone.

Of interest to defense attorney Leo Friedman was Mrs. Dodd’s statement that she often heard Vorhes call his wife, “Bossâ€?. In her opinion Lorraine Newton was the quarrelsome type, not her husband.

Witness Anthelmo Quaves said he saw an auto containing a man and woman drive slowly into the lonely canyon and heard yelling and the sounds of someone being beaten. He said he saw the auto come back speeding out of the canyon.

Lorraine’s mother, Mrs.Tuttle, said her daughter was improving and identified her engagement and wedding rings

Defense attorney Leo Friedman revealed that Mrs. Newton knew she was pregnant, wanted to confirm it with a doctor and left open an abortion.

Newton sat solemnly at a student’s desk in the makeshift courtroom, obviously relieved when Deputy Sheriff Jack O’Brien escorted from out of the courtroom and back to the car that would return him to the Redwood City County Jail.

Outside the courtroom in Half Moon Bay, defense attorney Leo Friedman joked with reporters and photographers. They knew him from for his role in two sensational trials, that of Mrs. Frances Andrews and David Lamson.

Lorraine Newton did not make an appearance. So far she had remained in the background.

To be continued….

Whether the San Mateo County District Attorney would press for the death penalty in the Vorhes Newton case was not yet known. Newton’s was a heinous crime, the killer of his two little children who were left to die on a lonely road in Montara—and the attempted murder of his young pregnant wife.

Luckily, 21-year-old=year Lorraine Newton had survied and was slowly recovering from severe head injuries in a Half Moon Bay hospital in the summer of 1946.

Lorraine hadn’t been told that the babies were dead, and although she hadn’t talked to her husband, the pair both agreed about one thing: neither remembered what happened at the end of that horrible day. They’d had an argument about abortion, they remembered that, but then both Lorraine and Vorhes maintained they blanked out and couldn’t recall anything else.

The prosecutors had no trouble mapping out what had happened. They had an open and shut case, with testimony, evidence and the murder weapon in their possession, enough to convict and ask for the death penalty. The prosecution was anxious to go to trial, which they predicted would be short and sweet.

The prosecution team also bragged that they had damning testimony even if Newton’s wife couldn’t testify—but they believed she would be well enough to do so. They had the murder weapons, a sharp-edged shovel and a baby’s milk bottle.

Vorhes Newton was not a loner, not without the love and support of his wealthy family, his father an affluent farmer from nearby Lodi, and one of his brothers a successful “coin phonographâ€? operator. His parents and siblings rushed to his side at the county jail, strategizing with Leo Friedman, the nationally known and colorful attorney who replaced former superior judge Alden Ames, said to have had second thoughts about representing the controversial defendant.

Fresh from winning several tough cases for his clients, Leo Friedman huddled with Vorhes Newton’s family, discussing strategy. He walked away forty five minutes later telling the press Vorhes impressed him “as a lovely boy with a good record. I don’t even know that he did it. If anybody did do anything like this—he must be crazy.â€?

After the legal conference with Friedman, Newton followed his new lawyer’s advice and refused to give up any information during future grilling by detectives—even though he had already allegedly confessed bludgeoning the babies to death.

Friedman wanted that confession repudiated because it had been elicited under the duress of grilling. He mentioned the possibility of a plea of “not guilty by reason of insanityâ€?.

County District Attorney Gilbert Ferrell said that Mrs. Newton was pregnant but, when asked if she would keep the baby, he said no one had that answer– but that the pregnancy was certainly the cause of the argument between the couple and the violent events that followed. Vorhes and Lorraine Newton, Ferrell said, were arguing about the abortion, an illegal medical procedure in 1946. Ferrell did not reveal whether husband or wife was for or against it.

Medical experts believed the beating Lorraine received could lead to a miscarriage.

Her parents, residents of southern California, came to their daughter’s bedside. Lorraine’s father, Frank Tuttle, was the port auditor at Los Angeles. She had still not been told of her children’s deaths but was conscious and conversing with nurses at the Coastside hospital.

But would she appear as a witness at her husband’s trial?

To be continued….