The Verdict (1925)

Carol Kingsley and Jimmy Mason, who are both employed in a fashion emporium run by Pierre Ronsard, fall in love and are married. Victor Ronsard, the son of the owner, falls in love with Carol and designs to break up the Mason marriage. He falsely informs Carol that Jimmy, who is the Ronsard bookkeeper, is short in his accounts and that, if she will have dinner with him, he will give her the incriminating papers. Carol reluctantly goes to dinner, and Ronsard is felled by a shot fired by an unknown intruder. Jimmy is later proven to have been in the vicinity at the time of the crime; he is arrested, tried, and sentenced to death in the electric chair. At the last minute, Jimmy is granted a temporary reprieve and given a new trial. Carol seeks to sacrifice herself for Jimmy by confessing that she committed the crime, but Ronsard's butler comes forward and informs the jury that he killed Ronsard in self-defense when Ronsard attacked him.