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Originally Posted by BobC
If he was so guilty of perjury, why was he never prosecuted then? Even today people make lots of accusations that go nowhere. Also, if in trying to get through this he listens to different people, like the White Sox attorneys who were advising him at some point, and then others at different times, he's going to get thrown into a lot of different directions trying to do what everyone is telling him at that time. Not saying it is right, but his situation is a lot more gray than most of the others. Plus, hate to bring it up again, but there was no specific rule in place at the time of the 1919 scandal about what was done. Also, the actual trial wasn't about a specific law being broken, but about how the Black Sox players by throwing the World Series had cheated their their non-complicit teammates out of their share of the WS winning money. In fact, I believe teammate Shano Collins was named as the wronged party in the indictments, not baseball, the fans, or anyone else. Also heard that Comiskey supposedly went ahead and paid the difference in player's money earned between the winners and losers of the World Series to White Sox players not part of the scandal. So Collins and the others it seems were made whole and didn't suffer any financial loss after all. It is all very strange and confusing, and based on Comiskey's and the team's actions during all this has to make one wonder if they maybe had a bigger role in all this that they were trying to keep covered up.
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Jackson was charged with perjury, it was investigated and a warrant was issued for his arrest and he failed to show up for a pre-trial hearing.
In his civil trial, Jackson testified he never made the statements that were in grand jury transcripts, he claimed no one ever approached him about a fix, then admitted he took $5,000, there were just way too many inconsistencies to believe anything he said. No matter who was coaching him on what to say, the truth is the truth.