The Evening Edition of the Stew Peters Show Features Mrs. Mary Phagan Kean, March 11, 2025

The Stew Peters Network | Broadcasted on March 11, 2025 | Anti-Defamation League (ADL) of B’nai B’rith: Defending a Guilty Pedophile-Rapist Since September 1913

Paraphrased Introduction:

Stew Peters: "Good evening, and welcome to a special episode of the Stew Peters Show. Not many groups have as much power as the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, or ADL, here and around the world. Tonight, we’ve got Mary Phagan Kean, who almost never does interviews—she has hardly done many in the last 40 years. She’s here to tell us why she’s speaking out now about this case."

Mary Phagan Kean: "There’s a reason I’m doing this. A former Georgia Governor, Roy Barnes, a rabbi named Steve Lebow from Cobb County, and Fulton County DA Fani Willis—who tried to go after Trump—are teaming up with the 'Innocence Project' to clear Leo Frank’s name in 2025. That’s why I’m on this show. People outside Georgia need to know what’s really going on, how it all started, and how it’s kept going."

Mary Phagan Kean’s Thoughts After the Stew Peters Show: Fighting for the Truth About the Leo Frank Case No Matter What

By Christy Williams (Guest Writer)
March 25, 2025

On March 11, 2025, Mary Phagan Kean, who turns 71 on June 5th, went on the Stew Peters Show and shared a powerful, personal story. She’s the great-niece of Mary Anne Phagan, a 13-year-old girl who was raped and strangled in 1913—a crime that started a huge legal fight still debated today, 112 years later. Mary Kean isn’t just retelling history; she’s begging people to protect the truth from lies spread by Leo Frank’s supporters for over a century.

A Life Shaped by the Tragedy and Determination for Truth

Mary Kean first heard about her great-aunt, “Little Mary,” in 1967 when she was 13. What started as a kid’s question turned into a lifelong mission to dig up the real story of Little Mary’s rape and murder and the trial that found Leo Frank guilty—guilty without any doubt, she says. For Mary Kean, this isn’t just a hobby; it’s a duty to keep her family’s story straight and stop Frank’s backers from burying the truth with fake tales and made-up evidence.

“This case has taken over my grown-up life,” she told me after the show. “When you’re named after a beloved child who was murdered in your family, you feel like you have to make sure the real facts—the ones proven in court—don’t get covered up or twisted to fool people.”

You can watch the full Stew Peters show containing the interview or a shorter version with just Mary Kean’s discussion using the web link in the show’s notes below.

A Messy Fight Over What Really Happened

The Leo Frank case—or just “the Frank case”—is still a sore spot in Georgia. Leo Frank, a 29-year-old Jewish boss at the National Pencil Company in Atlanta, ran a sweatshop factory making pencils from 1908 until he got arrested in 1913. After that, Herbert Schiff took over until 1916. Little Mary Phagan worked there, putting in 55 hours a week for just $4, paid every Saturday. She’d been there a year when, on April 26, 1913—a holiday called Confederate Memorial Day when the factory was closed—she went in to pick up her last $1.20. She didn’t come out alive. Frank raped her, strangled her with a packing cord, and left her mutilated body in the factory basement. He was the last person known to see her alive, and he acted shaky and nervous when people asked him about it. Frank tried to direct suspicion for the murder on a former White employee, John or James Gant. Frank also tried to direct suspicion on Newt Lee his black nightwatchman, and later Jim Conley, his factory sweeper. 

Four months later, on August 25, 1913, a jury found Frank guilty of murder after a month-long trial. They said he raped her first, which made the crime even worse—back then, that kind of thing meant death by judicial hanging or extrajudicial lynching for men who did it. The evidence was so strong nobody could argue he didn’t do it. The judge, Leonard Roan, said things that made sure the case would go to higher courts, helping his old friend and Frank’s lawyer, Luther Rosser. Roan sentenced Frank to hang and wouldn’t give him a new trial when petitioned. Higher courts in Georgia and the U.S. agreed the guilty verdict was solid, they left his guilt in place. But then Georgia Governor John Slaton, whose law firm worked for Frank, changed the death sentence to life in prison on June 21, 1915. People were furious, calling it crooked and wrong. That led to a group called the "Vigilance Committee" grabbing Frank from jail on August 16, 1915, and hanging him the next day. Some say it was the “Knights of Mary Phagan,” but that’s a fake name made up by Frank’s supporters to blame the Ku Klux Klan. Back then, the KKK actually let Jewish people join.

In 1915, most Americans thought Frank was innocent because big names like Albert Lasker, a master advertising guy, and Adolph Ochs, who owned the New York Times, paid newspapers to push stories saying Frank didn’t do it. They drowned out the real evidence with lies. Movies like Birth of a Nation and a Frank film, Thou Shalt Not Kill, played in thousands of Jewish-owned theaters known then as Loews, making him look like a good guy who got framed. Mary Kean sees past all that. She says Frank’s supporters—have spent 112 years planting fake stories in newspapers so later generations could point to them and say he was innocent.

“I’ve been studying this for 57 years,” she said. “It vexes me how groups keep trying to make Frank a victim of hate against Jews. The court records tell the real story—facts they hide by leaving out the big stuff that proves he did it.”

“The real problem,” she added firmly, “isn’t looking at old cases with new eyes. It’s how they pick only the tiny mistakes to say he’s innocent and ignore the mountain of proof that he’s guilty. It’s a trick.”

Mary Kean listed key facts that got buried: Monteen Stover said Frank wasn't in his office when the police later figured out the murder happened in the metal room, ruining his alibi; blood and hair in the factory’s metal room tied right to Little Mary’s death; and lots of women who worked there said Frank acted creepy and perverted all the time. She also found fake stuff Frank's defenders slipped into newspapers over the years—like rumors and made-up evidence—to help Frank’s case later. She’s exposing all that in her new book coming out in 2025, showing how to spot and bust those lies. Her new book will debunk many hoaxes. 

Dealing with Politics and Court Truth

In our long talks by phone and email, Mary Kean broke down how race, religion, and money keep this case heated. She hates that Frank got lynched but says that doesn’t change the fact he was guilty in court.

“We can say lynching is awful and still see that the trial followed the rules back then,” she explained. “Georgia’s top court said the evidence sustained the jury's verdict. The coroner’s jury voted 6-0 against him. The grand jury, with five Jewish people sworn, said 21-0 he should face trial. The trial jury—poor and rich folks—voted 12-0 he was guilty. Judge Roan wouldn’t give him another chance when Frank's attorneys asked for a new trial. Georgia’s high court said the verdict was rock-solid. The U.S. Supreme Court said the trial was fair, even with some arguing that the newspapers narrative was the correct dissenting narrative. In 1982, Georgia wouldn’t clear his name, and the 1986 pardon didn’t say he was innocent—just left him guilty.” She laid it all out over Signal App, and it hit hard.

A Big Moment in America’s Courts and Culture

Leo Frank’s trial, guilty verdict, and lynching changed America big-time. It started the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith or ADL for brief, in September 1913 under the Independent Order of B’nai B’rith, to defend Frank. After the ADL got Leo Frank a bogus pardon in 1986, they dropped B'nai B'rith from their name. Now both ADL and B'nai B'rith are huge groups, but they have long engaged in generations of dirty politics since their unique origins—like for instance the ADL spying for South Africa’s racist government in the 1980s. Today, ADL pushes for shutting down free speech and picks some groups to help over others despite claiming they fight bigotry and prejudice for all. 

Frank ran the factory and led Atlanta’s B’nai B’rith while using kids like Little Mary for cheap labor. The ADL and its pals in newspapers, schools, and government have spent 112 years trying to make Frank look like a good guy hurt by anti-Jewish hate. Jewish groups call him a hero and a saint, using his face to fight hate against Jews. In March 2025, the ADL’s X post about his 1986 pardon got way more views than other stuff they’ve posted. A 2024 post about his lynching’s 109th year hit 13 million views—maybe a sign their boss, Jonathan Greenblatt, sees Frank as a star, not the killer Mary Kean’s proof shows.

But she says that’s all wrong compared to the piles of evidence: court papers, jury votes, and higher court rulings all say Frank did it, even with his fancy lawyers and money. Those legal papers sit ignored in Georgia’s court files. The KKK back then thought Frank was innocent and blamed Black guys Newt Lee and Jim Conley, but Mary Kean says that doesn’t change the court’s truth.

A Family Tie Across Religions

Even with the Jew vs. Gentile fight in play throughout this story, Mary Kean isn’t against Jewish people. Her family’s been close to a Jewish family for years. It started when her dad honored a Jewish soldier who died, and that family basically adopted the Phagans. Though they’re in heaven now, she still calls them “grandma” and “grandpa” with real love, not just politeness. That connection keeps going, standing beyond the test of time.

Protecting the Real Story Against Lies

In our second 40-minute talk after the show, Mary Kean told me how she went from a curious kid to a fighter for her great-aunt’s truth. Seeing all the money and power trying to clean up Frank’s mess, she swore to keep the facts straight. She wants Little Mary’s story to stay clear, not get wiped out by people twisting it for political expediency. 

She spelled out how Frank’s supporters have messed with the truth, sneaking fake stuff into newspapers over the years:

• Blaming Others: Frank and his B’nai B’rith buddies, Herbert and Leonard Haas, first tried to pin the crime on Newt Lee, a Black watchman, with a criminally forged bloody shirt, an incriminating time sheet, and obviously ghost-written murder notes. When that flopped, they went after janitor Jim Conley with a made-up club and pay slip. Jewish folks put these lies in papers back in the 1913, 1914, 1915, and all the decades in between till 2025, people still use them today to defend Frank.
• Fake Teeth Story: Later, they made up a story about bite marks on Mary that didn’t match Frank’s teeth. The autopsy never mentioned bites. Mary Kean says it’s bunk.
• Trashing Little Mary: They spread rumors she flirted, trying to make her look bad instead of Frank. There’s no proof but it’s been repeated since to flip the blame.
• Made-Up Mob: They claimed angry crowds yelled “Hang the Jew or we’ll hang you!” at the jury. Court records and old newspapers Mary Kean collected show no such thing. Surprisingly, Steve Oney proved it’s a lie.
• Messing with Her Grave: Without her family’s OK, Frank’s fans changed a sign at Mary’s grave to hint he was innocent. Mary Kean thinks it’s tied to hiding the truth, with news clippings from the Marietta Daily Journal to support that belief. 
• Secret Plans: For 40 years, up to now in 2025, Frank’s people have met secretly with Georgia officials, keeping the Phagans, press, public and everyone in between out, trying to erase his guilt. It hasn’t worked yet, but they’re still at it again, using old lies from Leo Frank's defense leagues and other pro-Frank groups rigged up decades ago. 

Mary Kean’s got a new version of her book, The Rape-Murder of Little Mary Phagan, coming in 2025. It’ll show more proof Frank was guilty and take apart the 100 years of tricks his supporters pulled, especially the fake newspaper stuff she tracked down.

She asked people to share the Stew Peters show and learn the real deal by reading the original legal documents of the Leo Frank case and the newspaper reports of the day, saying it’s key to understanding power games in America today. “The truth isn’t something you can twist,” she finished. “It’s something you’ve got to stand up for.” Hopefully more people will read study the dry leaves of the case and look at what the newspapers wrote each day from the day Little Mary Phagan was discovered to the day Leo Frank was convicted. This is where you learn what happened. Frank's appellate review is just the icing on the cake. The news reports recount how Frank's defenders tried to bribe witness to recant their testimony at the trial. One person tried to get a jail attendant name Annie Maud Carter to poison Jim Conley. 

APPENDIX:

Below is the original inscription on the historical marker at Mary Phagan’s grave site (1994):

Mary Phagan Celebrated in song as “Little Mary Phagan” after her murder on Confederate Memorial Day, 1913, in Atlanta. Grave marked by CSA veterans in 1915. Tribute by Tom Watson set 1933. Leo Frank, sentenced to hang, granted clemency before lynching August 17, 1915. His 1986 pardon is based on State’s failure to protect him/apprehend killers, not Frank’s innocence.

Below is what it was then changed to with no vote and no media present, in 1995:

Celebrated in song as “Little Mary Phagan” after her murder at age 13 on April 26, 1913, in Atlanta [Georgia]. The trial and conviction of Leo Frank were controversial, as was the commutation of his death sentence four days before Confederate Veterans marked her grave on June 25, 1915. He was abducted and lynched August 17, 1915. In 1986 he was issued a pardon.

The (December 2, 1995) Marietta Daily Journal published an article describing what happened and why the Phagan family was outraged by this action:

Family of Mary Phagan protests marker change

Without a formal vote and with the press absent, Marietta City Council has changed the inscription on the city’s historic marker at the grave of rape-murder victim Mary Phagan in the Marietta City Cemetery. The Phagan family is blaming Councilman Philip Goldstein.

The descendants of Miss Phagan are upset because the family was not notified before or after the change, and only learned of it on a cemetery-cleaning visit. The family says the newly-placed marker – which sits on a city-maintained path near the grave and is not to be confused with Miss Phagan’s ornate tombstone, which makes no mention of the circumstances of her death – omits the reason for the 1986 posthumous pardon given Leo Frank.

Frank – Miss Phagan’s boss – was convicted in 1913 by a Fulton Superior Court jury of the 13-year-old girl’s murder in an Atlanta pencil factory and sentenced to hang. When Gov. John Slaton commuted Frank’s sentence to life in 1915, a group of Marietta men abducted Frank from the state prison near Milledgeville and lynched him near what is now the Big Chicken on Frey’s Gin Road in Marietta.

The Phagan family initially opposed placing a marker at their ancestor’s grave, fearing there would be increased damage to the cemetery plot and curiosity seekers would leave graffiti. That hasn’t happened. Late Mayor Joe Mack Wilson told east Cobb resident and Cherokee County special education teacher Mary Phagan Keen, a great-niece of Mary Phagan, that the grave was the most sought by visitors to Marietta and should have a marker, along with several other notable graves in the cemetery.

Mayor Wilson told the Phagan family the city would let them approve the text of the marker. The family insisted the unusual conditions of Frank’s 1986 pardon be explained. That was done. Now controversy has arisen because that portion of the marker has been changed.

The Georgia Pardons and Parole Board in 1983 turned down a request for a pardon based on Frank’s alleged innocence. [Leo] Frank’s former office boy, Alonzo Mann, told two Nashville Tennessean newsmen he saw black janitor Jim Conley holding a limp body in his arms the day of the murder. In its 1983 denial of a pardon for Frank, the board said after Mann’s testimony it “did not find conclusive evidence proving beyond any doubt that Frank was innocent.”

A new parole board then granted Frank a pardon in 1986 on the grounds the state did not protect him in prison, thereby allowing him to be lynched and thus ending any further court appeals. Frank’s conviction was appealed unsuccessfully by his lawyers three times to the Georgia Supreme Court and twice to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The 1986 pardon said: “Without attempting to address the question of guilt or innocence, and in recognition of the state’s failure to protect the person of Leo M. Frank and thereby preserve his opportunity for continued legal appeal of his conviction, and in recognition of the state’s failure to bring his killers to justice, and as an effort to heal old wounds…the board hereby grants to Leo M. Frank a pardon.” The family opposed the 1986 pardon and now is irked at the council and [Philip] Goldstein.

[By April 1915, Leo Frank had exhausted all avenues of appeal, having pursued and completed every available legal recourse through both the Georgia Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court. Despite this, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles failed to acknowledge the finality of his trial outcome.]

“We are as much a victim as the family of Leo Frank,” said Ms. Keen. For 80 years, we have been the object of the curiosity-seekers and subjected to unfair and untrue books and TV docudramas. The current council didn’t show the same respect to us as did Mayor Wilson and a previous council.” Ms. Keen’s father, James Phagan, said the action was “extremely insensitive of the council” and “disingenuous of Councilman [Philip] Goldstein. How can you separate Mary Phagan and Leo Frank?” he asked. “Can you mention the Holocaust and not mention Hitler? It’s simply pandering by Councilman [Philip] Goldstein to a segment of the community. It’s another effort to change history.”

The inscription change was made by the Parks and Tourism Committee chaired by Councilman Dan Cox. Members are Councilwoman Betty Hunter and Goldstein. The full council OK’d the action. Cox admitted the committee had yielded to “political pressure” by [Philip] Goldstein and the Jewish community. Calling the change “a no-win situation,” Cox said he reluctantly consented to the change “because it offended a part of the community.”

[Leo Frank's Lynching Site
1200 Roswell Road
Marietta, Cobb County, Georgia 30060, USA
August 17, 1995]

On the 80th anniversary of Frank’s lynching on Aug. 17, [1995] a group of Jewish leaders led by Rabbi Steven Lebow of Temple Kol Emeth in East Cobb said the historic marker at Mary Phagan’s grave should be removed. The group placed a small plaque in the side of the VPI Corp. building owned by Roy Varner at 1200 Roswell St., near the site of Frank’s lynching. The plaque reads: “Wrongly Accused, Falsely Convicted and Wantonly Murdered.” Attending the ceremony were Marietta Councilmen Goldstein and James Dodd, who told Jewish leaders they would look into removing the line of the marker that refers to the pardon conditions.

“This is a plaque that marks the grave of Mary Phagan,” said [Philip] Goldstein. “The last two lines deal with information on Leo Frank, and it’s not his grave.” Goldstein was quoted in the Jewish Times as saying: “The wording is factually correct. The mention of Frank [not getting officially exonerated] on Phagan’s marker should be deleted because it is irrelevant, not because it upsets the Jewish community.”

It was [James] Dodd who brought the matter before council, supported by [Philip] Goldstein. “This is a lose-lose situation for me,” [Philip] Goldstein said. The marker referring to the condition of Frank’s pardon has been removed and replaced with a marker the Phagan family had objected to.

To the Marietta Daily Journal: A December 12, 1995, letter to the editor regarding the incident:

DEAR EDITOR: Bill Kinney’s “Around Town” column December 2nd told of a change made in the wording on a historical marker near the grave of Mary Phagan in the Marietta City Cemetery. Censored from the original marker was reference to the dubious “pardon” given Leo Frank in 1986 for the rape and murder of Ms. Phagan. He was convicted of the crime in 1913, and the conviction was upheld three times by the Georgia’s Supreme Court and twice by the U.S. Supreme Court. The Phagan family was never notified that a change in wording on the historical marker was being sought or made. They learned of it while on a cemetery-cleaning visit.

[Bill] Kinney explained: “The inscription change was made by the Parks and Tourism Committee chaired by Councilman Dan Cox. Members are Betty Hunter and Philip Goldstein… [Dan] Cox admitted the committee yielded to ‘political pressure’ by Goldstein and Jewish Community.” And the Marietta City Council went along without a formal vote and the press absent.

The MDJ is to be commended for exposing this insensitive, conniving, deplorable action. The Jewish community should not conspire and manipulate to change history to suit its wishes. Jewish leaders should denounce this contrived deed and urge that the original wording on the historical marker be restored.

— T.J. Campbell,

Smyrna Georgia

Direct Source

Phagan-Kean, Mary Frances. (March 17, 2025). Video: Mary Phagan-Kean Speaks Out on the Leo Frank Case. Retrieved on March 18, 2025:
littlemaryphagan.com/video-mary-phagan-kean-speaks-out-on...

Little Mary Phagan. The website of Mary Phagan-Kean. 2025. littlemaryphagan.com

Further Reading and Related References

Librarian, Leo Frank Case Research Library. (March 16, 2025). Mary Phagan-Kean Interviewed on Stew Peters Program. Accessed from http://www.leofrank.info/mary-phagan-kean-interviewed-on-stew-peters-program

Olson, K. (2025). The Leo Frank Case Research Library. Accessed from http://www.leofrank.info

Peters, S. (March 11, 2025). SPN Exclusive: Grand-niece of Mary Phagan-Kean Discusses the 1913 Tragedy. Accessed from http://www.rumble.com/v6qhu42-exclusive-grand-neice-of-mary-phagen-kean-murdered-by-pedo-jew-in-1913-expo.html?e9s=src_v1_ucp

Peters, S. (March 11, 2025). SPN Exclusive: Grand Niece of Mary Phagan-Kean Discusses the 1913 Tragedy. Accessed from http://www.stewpeters.com/show/exclusive-grand-neice-of-mary-phagan-kean-murdered-by-pedo-jew-in-1913-exposes-the-adl

Phagan-Kean, M. (2025). Mary Frances Phagan Kean Legacy Project. Accessed from http://www.MaryPhagan.com

Dyson, D. (2025). Leo Frank Library. Accessed from http://www.LeoFrank.org

Enright, J. (2025). Leo Frank Papers. Accessed from http://www.LeoFrank.com