Joseph P. Jenkins

Joseph P. Jenkins was one of the lawyers who sought federal review of Dick and Perry Smith’s convictions after their trial. Appointed by a federal judge and working without compensation, Jenkins and Robert Bingham challenged the fairness of the proceedings through repeated appeals; their efforts postponed three execution dates, though they did not prevent the executions from ultimately being carried out.

Appointment and Role

Three years after the trial, Jenkins and Bingham replaced Russell Shultz, who had resigned from the case. The narrative describes the two Kansas City lawyers as exceptionally skillful. They accepted the appointments without compensation, motivated by their conviction that the defendants had been subjected to a profoundly unfair trial.

The available account gives no personal history or individual statements by Jenkins. It presents him as part of a joint legal effort: the appeals were filed by Jenkins and Bingham together, and the book does not distinguish which lawyer developed or argued any particular claim.

Grounds for Appeal

Jenkins and Bingham argued that Dick and Perry Smith had been unjustly convicted because legal counsel was not appointed until after they had confessed and waived preliminary hearings. They also challenged the competence of the representation at trial and objected to the use of evidence seized without a search warrant: a shotgun and a knife taken from Dick’s home.

A further ground concerned the trial’s location. The lawyers argued that the court should have granted a change of venue because publicity in the surrounding area had been saturated with material prejudicial to the accused. Together, these claims challenged the conditions under which the confessions were obtained, the defense provided at trial, the admissibility of physical evidence, and the possibility of an impartial local proceeding.

Appeals and Their Limits

Jenkins and Bingham carried the case to the Supreme Court of the United States three times. On each occasion, the Court refused to grant certiorari, the writ that would have allowed a full hearing. The appeals therefore did not produce the review the lawyers sought, though they did defer the scheduled executions: October 25, 1962; August 8, 1963; and February 18, 1965.

By March 1965, Dick and Perry Smith had spent almost two thousand days in their Death Row cells. The Kansas Supreme Court then set their executions for the hours between midnight and 2:00 a.m. on April 14. Jenkins and Bingham’s work had repeatedly interrupted that timetable, but the refusal of further appeals left the convictions in place and the executions proceeded.