A1state v. Bowman
| Decision Date | 31 January 1879 |
| Citation | 80 N.C. 432 |
| Court | North Carolina Supreme Court |
| Parties | STATE v. THOMAS P. BOWMAN. |
INDICTMENT for Murder removed from Guilford and tried at Fall Term, 1878, of RANDOPH Superior Court, before Kerr, J.
The prisoner was charged with killing his wife by administering poison. The evidence in support of the charge was circumstantial, and only that part as was deemed material to the exceptions taken is incorporated in the statement of the case sent to this court; and that which is deemed sufficient to an understanding of the opinion is as follows: Martha Cole, a witness for the state, testified in the course of her examination that about two hours after the death of Mrs. Bowman, she went around the prisoner's dwelling towards the kitchen which was situated about twelve yards from the dwelling, and was about seventeen by fourteen feet in size, with a north door and a south door. The witness on going into the kitchen at the north door saw prisoner sitting on a bench at the east end of the kitchen, just twelve feet from the south door. The prisoner and deceased's little daughter, Eliza Jane Bowman, was sitting in the south door and a servant was putting on her shoes. Just as the witness went into the kitchen, having the instant before seen prisoner sitting on the bench as above stated, one of the women present said, “I'd like to know what Mrs. Bowman did say when she was dying;” and thereupon the little girl turned around, put both hands on the floor, looked up, and said, The prisoner then came and took the child up in his arms, smiled, carried her off, and kept her with him in his immediate presence while the company remained at the house. The witness further stated that she knew the prisoner was in hearing when these declarations were made. The exception to this testimony was overruled, and in the charge to the jury in respect thereto, His Honor said “that it was admissible, not as in itself of any weight against the prisoner, but as calculated, should the jury believe he heard and understood what his little daughter then said, to call forth from him some response in words, or some action, which response and which action are alone to go to the jury and to be considered by them in making up their verdict.” The court further charged that it was for the jury to say, from all the evidence in the case, whether the declarations of the little girl were made in the hearing of the prisoner, and how far his action tended to prove his guilt.
Prof. Redd, an expert in chemistry, was introduced by the state and testified that he went to Reidsville on the 24th of July, 1877, on his way to disinter the body of the deceased, and to take therefrom the tissues and organs for chemical analysis; that he declined to proceed until the prisoner's counsel were notified; upon notice given, three gentlemen of the bar of counsel for prisoner went with the witness and saw the organs, &c., actually taken from the body of the deceased, and the means the witness used to preserve and transport them to the state university at Chapel Hill where the analysis was made; that he informed said counsel of his intention to make a chemical analysis of said organs, and would have admitted an expert or agent of the prisoner to be present, had the prisoner or his counsel requested it. When the witness was about to give the result of the analysis, the prisoner's counsel objected on the ground it had been made without notice to the prisoner or his counsel, and was therefore ex parte and inadmissible. The objection was overruled, and the witness stated that the analysis disclosed the presence of strychnia in the said organs and tissues.
The facts applicable to the other exceptions are stated in the opinion. Verdict of guilty, judgment, appeal by prisoner. See same case, 78 N. C., 509.Attorney General and Boyd & Reid, for the state .
Messrs. Reid & Glenn, for the prisoner .
The record and statement of the case are quite voluminous, but it is only necessary to notice so much thereof as is pertinent to the instructions prayed for and the exceptions taken by the prisoner.
First, as to the special instructions asked:--
1. “That the burden of proof was on the state, and that the state must prove the prisoner to be guilty to the satisfaction of the jury beyond a reasonable doubt, or else the prisoner was entitled to an acquittal.” This was given, and His Honor committed no error in superadding thereto, “that when the act of killing a human being wilfully is fully proved, the law presumes the killing to have been done with malice aforethought, and the burden of proving mitigating and justifying circumstances is thrown on the party who claims the benefit of these circumstances. State v. Johnson, 3 Jones, 266; State v. Willis, 63 N. C., 26; Foster, 255.
2. “That the law requires them to be unanimous in their verdict, and in case one of the jury had doubts as to the guilt of the prisoner, it was the duty of the other jurors to yield...
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State v. Buchanan, No. 317A89
...The breadth of interpretation of what constitutes a "stage" in an accused's capital trial is not without limit, however. In State v. Bowman, 80 N.C. 432 (1879), the Court declined to extend a capital defendant's right to be present to include presence at the disinterment of the remains of t......
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State v. Hawkins, 290.
...in connection with the charge, is what gives the statement evidentiary weight. State v. Burton, 94 N. C. 947; State v. Bowman, 80 N.C. 432." "The general rule is that statements made to or in the presence and hearing of a person, accusing him of the commission of or complicity in a crime, a......
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State v. Portee, 426.
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