When Ernest Burkhart was on the stand, the prosecutor Leahy questioned him about his marriage to Mollie. “Your wife is an Osage Indian?” Leahy asked him. “She is,” Ernest replied. At an earlier proceeding, he was asked what his profession was, and he said, “I don’t work. I married an Osage.” One of Hale’s lawyers now asked Ernest if he’d pleaded guilty to murdering his wife’s sister by blowing up her house while she was inside. “That is right,” he said. Hoping to place the blame for the killings on Ernest, Hale’s lawyer recited the names of Mollie’s murdered family members, one after the
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