NATHAN COPLAN, Sworn In For The Defendant, 95th To Testify

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Nathan Coplan, witness for the Defendant in rebuttal, at the Trial of Leo Frank in the Fulton County Superior Court of Atlanta, Georgia, in 1913 (Testimony Portion From July 28 - August 21, 1913; Closing Arguments August 21-25, 1913)
Nathan Coplan, a member of B’nai B’rith, testified that on Thanksgiving Day 1912—a cold, disagreeable evening (possibly snowing)—the lodge held its annual charity dance at the Jewish Orphans’ Home.
Leo and Lucile Frank arrived before 8:00 p.m. and remained until 10:00 p.m., personally supervising every detail. Coplan saw them dancing, greeting guests, and tending children the entire time—never apart, never absent.
This public, two-hour alibi—in front of dozens of Atlanta’s most prominent Jewish families—obliterated the State’s whisper-campaign that Frank spent holidays luring factory girls to secret trysts.
Coplan’s calm, precise memory turned a Thanksgiving dance into a spotlight of innocence, proving Frank was exactly where a married philanthropist should be—surrounded by witnesses, far from the factory.

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