Detectives Mattingly, Raff and Wheeler and Sergt. Byrnes marched into the Police Court yesterday afternoon at the four corners of a hospital stretcher, on which lay William F. Lee, alias Hamilton Y. Gray, ex-policeman and alleged confidence man. One eye was nearly closed and the other open. He rolled his head rapidly from side to side and worked his lower jaw in a trembling way, like a man shivering with cold. He was laid on the floor in front of the clerk's desk, where he seemed oblivious to the proceedings, and was apparently in a stupor.
    Clerk Claggett came around to the side of the stretcher and read the information charging him with having obtained $14.50 from Urban G. Wynkoop, a young druggist, by pretending that he was Chief Engineer of the Corean Government, and that he would give Wynkoop a place as chemist. When the clerk finished the reading and asked "William F. Lee, alias Hamilton Y. Gray, are you guilty or not guilty?" the prostrate man wriggled his lower jaw even more convulsively than before and this was accepted as a plea of not guilty.
    Dr. Purvis, of Freedmen's Hospital, took the stand, and testified that Lee seemed to be trying to simulate paralysis, but that his temperature was about normal and his hands not cold as they would be in paralysis. Mr. Wynkoop, a mild-mannered young man, testified that Lee appointed him chemist-in-chief to his Corean Majesty, and brought him some papers bearing the signature of Secretary H. N. Allen, of the Corean Legation. In Mr. Wynkoop's presence Lee countersigned the papers in red ink and made some hieroglyphics below, which he said was Corean writing. Then he got the $14.50 from Wynkoop for a ticket to Chicago, from which place the Corean Legation was to start. Later he sent Wynkoop a letter, saying that his wife was sick and their departure would have to be delayed.
    Secretary Allen took the stand and said that Lee was in no way connected with the Corean Legation, that the red ink Corean inscription on the papers was unintelligible to him and that he never signed the papers. Detective Mattingly said that when he arrested Lee the latter admitted the swindle.
    Judge Mills sent Lee to the grand jury in $500 bonds. Throughout the trial Lee continued to appear unconscious and the Judge directed that during his confinement he be given proper care.

Source:

Unknown, "Brought in on a Stretcher, A Prisoner Feigns Paralysis while His Case is Tried," The Washington Post, Washington, D.C., Wednesday, 29 August 1888, p. 6.