Legal Lore: Tried for Treason: The Amazing Case of Private Dale Maple
Fred L. Borch
On April 24, 1944, at a court-martial convened deep inside the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, Army Private Dale Maple was found guilty of desertion and aiding the enemy. His sentence: to be hanged by the neck until dead. But Maple did not know that he had been sentenced to death, because the court-martial jury, which had conducted its proceedings in secret, had been ordered by the Army to keep its verdict secret as well—even from the defendant. What follows is the true story of the trial of Dale Maple, the first American-born soldier in the history of the Army ever to be found guilty of a crime that fits the constitutional definition of treason.