Carrie Brown : Murder In The East River Hotel

On another thread, Pete Damgaard mentioned the following in a discussion over scenarios on the night of the 23rd of April.

Third  post on this thread:

https://carriebrown.createaforum.com/general-discussion/twice-told-tale/

If he did not kill her, either Kniclo left for a while (to clean up, perhaps) or he left the door unlocked, and Ali entered to steal something. This also takes into account the story of Ali explaining this to his interpreter: he did not kill her, but was in her room. He gets her blood on him, retreats to his room, decides to wait, or falls asleep....

Something about the underlined section of his statement stuck in my mind. Today I went back and re-read what William Thompson, American stage actor, and Dr. Austin Flint, one of the prosecution's medical experts, had to say about what interpreter Emile Sultan told not only these two men, but others.


The storyline is essentially that Ali and Sultan were in conversation while the former was in custody. Hired by the French Consulate to assist the defense, Sultan's revelation made its way to the ears of one of the prosecution's medical team, and quite possibly others on the 'side' of the prosecution. It begs the question whether or not Sultan shared this information with the defense. Had he done so, and had Ali only told him he came into contact with the body or simply went into the room, it would undermine their effort to provide reasonable doubt.


Thompson and Flint both said that Sultan told them that Ali admitted to being in room 31...

This is the relevant section of the Buffalo Courier June 12, 1902 article with Thompson's remarks:

 "I am surprised that the story of 'Frenchy's' confession was not published long ago," said Mr. Thompson.  "I know the facts are in the possession of several men. The news of the confession could not by any means be called a secret."

    "Emilio Sultan, an Arab, kept cigar stores in Broadway and in 42nd Street, and it was there that I knew him.  He was the interpreter at Frenchy's trial.  Frenchy was a member of a wild ruffian tribe and he spoke more Arabic than French.

    "Sultan talked with Frenchy many times in jail.  The savage prisoner was glad to see the only man in New York with whom he could talk without restraint.  I used to drink coffee in Sultan's place and buy cigars (from) him, and he told me the story.  He said that Frenchy admitted the crime to him.

    "But his admission took a curious form.  On the night of the murder, Frenchy admitted he went to the room in which the woman's body lay.  He handled the mutilated body, he said, but would not admit killing the woman. Sultan has been dead for years.  I never regarded what he told me as a secret, for he never treated it as such."


Now....what Dr. Flint said in 1903, in Collected Essays.. a republication of his original 1891 remarks.


"The novelty of the testimony in this case, the unfamiliar anthropological type of the accused, the unusually brutal character of the crime and
the great interest in the prisoner on the part of some who believed him innocent and who finally secured his release seem to me to justify the republication of this article, although it is simply a condensation of Article XXXIV. It has been rumored that the prisoner made a confession to the person who interpreted his testimony at the trial and that the interpreter had told of this to several friends ; but the interpreter is dead and the story of a confession can not be verified."


Thompson states the he was told Ali did not admit to the murder.  Flint, on the other hand, doesn't specify whether Sultan told him that
Ali confessed to committing the murder or just merely being in the room.

 Let's put ourselves in Ali's shoes. We know from trial testimony ( Nellie English), that Ali had a thing for going into other rooms. Since
he apparently confessed to being in the room, consider these facts:

The ambient light in Room 31, the corner room situated at Catherine Slip and Water Street....was the only room in the hotel which would have received light from both of those streets.

Looking at the sketch.....how could Ali not notice she was dead?  What would possess him to come into contact with her corpse?

Was Ali's confession to Sultan just half of the true story?

Why confess at all?

It’s certainly a fair point How and one that can’t be brushed aside. The only points that I would make are:

1. How good was Ali’s sense of smell? It might seem like I’m trying to get him off the hook but some people do have a poorer sense of smell. Maybe he had a cold?
2. The time between Ali opening the door and climbing onto the bed could only have been a couple of seconds so if she had only just been murdered maybe any smell didn’t immediately register with him?
3. I can only imagine that the ERH wasn’t the most fragrant of establishments at the best of times.

2. The time between Ali opening the door and climbing onto the bed could only have been a couple of seconds so if she had only just been murdered, maybe any smell didn’t immediately register with him?

Possibly, but I believe the smell would have hit him immediately. IMHO

At any rate, the smell: Ali was a hardened veteran from a dirty war, and was used to living in squalid circumstances at a time when pungent odors were a daily part of life

If so, then he was familiar with the odors that result from wounds in that area of the body. Yes, it stunk back in the 19th century for sure....but there's no mistaking the
odor that was coming from her corpse for garden variety odors, I'd think.

I also recall that Carrie Brown's face was wrapped, indicating the killer was uncomfortable around the body, this to me signals a reluctance to touch her, be around her and by extension to search her belongings.

To me, it indicates he didn't want the victim to see what he was doing.

He was probably also blind drunk. So I find it possible that he could have entered the room, noticed she was dead, but still searched her for loot.

That makes our low opinion of Ali drop even further, doesn't it? 

It might seem like I’m trying to get him off the hook but some people do have a poorer sense of smell.

Not at all, Mike. You're correct, it goes without saying, that some people are more acute to odors than others.

She probably put any money she received from C. Kniclo in her Chinese muslin bag.
Her clothes were distributed across the room, as the NYEW put it, with the indifference of their class.

This is from the 25th ( New York Evening World) concerning the stench in the room, but
it was published a day after the murder. It still smelled to high heaven a day later.

The great patch of clotted blood which had dripped over the edge of the bed on the middle of the
 floor had not yet been removed. The stench in the place was horrible and sickening.

The temperature that night was 58 degrees Fahrenheit....one of the possible reasons her shoe was in the window, unless
someone other than CB and C Kniclo put the shoe in the window before the NYEW reporter began taking notes on the 24th.

Her muslin bag in the attachment