Candace Mossier and Melvin Lane Powers Trial: 1966

In closing arguments prosecutor Gerald Kogan submitted that Candy Mossler's strange nocturnal visits to the hospital, all between the hours of midnight and 7:00 A.M., were undertaken to establish an alibi. He further submitted that the evidence, although circumstantial, could lead to only one reasonable conclusion: Powers and Candy Mossler had conspired to kill Jacques Mossier.

From among the several of defense lawyers, it was Percy Foreman who commanded center stage. In his closing 6Vz hour speech Foreman laid the blame for Mossler's death everywhere except at the door of Melvin Powers. He blamed the police for entering into a "monetary conspiracy" with the dead man's daughter; he blamed "Dade County justice"; he accused police of buying testimony from "a lifetime thief and other ex-convicts"; he recited passages from the Scripture and Shakespeare. He concluded the masterly, if somewhat discursive, oration by thundering, "Let him among you without sin cast the first stone." Then Foreman sat down, smiling, confident he had won over the all-male jury.

And so it proved. After 16 hours and 44 minutes of deliberation on March 6, 1966, they returned a verdict of not guilty. State Attorney Richard Gerstein received the news in grim silence. Later, watching Candy first embrace Powers, then several of the jurors, he remarked, "I don't agree with the verdict, but this is the American system."