State v. Raven

• Decision Date: 02 May 1893
• Citation: 115 Mo. 419,22 S.W. 376
• Parties: STATE v. RAVEN.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

22 S.W. 376

115 Mo. 419

STATE v. RAVEN.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 2.

May 2, 1893.

MURDER — EVIDENCE — IMPEACHMENT OF WITNESS — SUSPENSION OF TRIAL — INSTRUCTIONS.

1. On a trial for murder it was proper to exclude a statement by deceased, made to a witness a week after the quarrel, since it was not part of the res gestae, and there was no evidence that it was made in articulo mortis.

2. In discrediting a witness the inquiry is not limited to his general reputation for truth, but may be extended to his general moral character.

3. It was not error, after the evidence was all in, to refuse to delay the trial until the arrival of a train on which defendant expected a witness, when the application was not accompanied by an affidavit, and the record shows that the alleged witness was not on the train, and that the instructions to the jury were not completed until after its arrival.

4. On a trial for murder it was proper for the court, on the written inquiry of the jury whether there is a degree of crime between murder in the second degree and manslaughter in the third degree, to give an instruction, in the presence of defendant and counsel, defining manslaughter in the second degree.

Appeal from circuit court, Marion county; Thomas H. Bacon, Judge.

Maria Raven was indicted for murder in the first degree. She was convicted of manslaughter in the second degree, and appeals. Affirmed.

R. E. Anderson, for appellant. The Attorney General, for the State.

GANTT, P. J.

The defendant was indicted on the 13th day of January, 1892, in the Hannibal court of common pleas. She was charged with murder in the first degree of John Washington, on the 23d day of October, 1891. The indictment was in the usual form, and was sufficient. She was arraigned, and a plea of not guilty entered, and was awarded, on her application, a change of venue to the circuit court at Palmyra. She was tried at the June term, and convicted of manslaughter in the second degree, and her punishment assessed at five years in the penitentiary, and from this sentence she has appealed. She has filed no brief in this court, and accordingly we have examined the whole record. From it we glean the following facts: The defendant and the deceased were both negroes, living in Hannibal; and the killing was the result of jealousy, the outgrowth of an illicit cohabitation. On the night of October 23, 1891, Maria Raven, the defendant, and another negro woman, were going down Main street, in the city of Hannibal, when they saw John Washington, the deceased, in company with a negro woman, across the street, going in the opposite direction. From what subsequently transpired, it appears that the deceased and the defendant had been living together as man and wife. When the defendant saw the deceased in company with another woman, she rushed across the street, caught him by the lapel of the coat, and began a tirade of abuse. A fight ensued, in which he struck her several times with his fist, and she threw three paving bricks at him. The first and second missed him, and the third struck him across the front and left side of the head, felling him to the ground. She then ran away. He got up, staggered to a stairway near at hand, sat there bleeding from the mouth and nose for a time, was then helped to his feet, walked down the street about half a block, when he again had to sit down and rest for a time. He was then helped to his feet, and with difficulty got to his lodging, some three or four blocks from where he was struck. He laid there unconscious for three or four days. Doctors were called in, who prescribed bromides and remedies to reduce fever. After the third or fourth day he regained consciousness, and improved so much that he walked down in the city, and consulted his physician. About the end of the second week he went to work again, complaining, however, of great pain in his head. He only worked five days, when he again relapsed into unconsciousness, and died November 15, 1891. A post-mortem examination revealed a large triangular fracture of the skull, on the left side of his head. At its base a large quantity of pus was formed, and the brain greatly inflamed. The physicians who attended him and made the post-mortem testified the wound was almost necessarily mortal, and unquestionably caused his death.

1. The case was well tried. The questions were simple, and but very few objections to testimony...