Adams v. State
| Decision Date | 02 January 1901 |
| Docket Number | 19,240 |
| Citation | 59 N.E. 24,156 Ind. 596 |
| Parties | Adams v. The State |
| Court | Indiana Supreme Court |
Rehearing Denied June 27, 1901.
From the Sullivan Circuit Court.
Affirmed.
John S Bays and John T. Hays, for appellant.
Wm. L Taylor, Attorney-General, and E. W. McIntosh, for State.
Appellant was tried and convicted before a jury in the lower court on a charge of murder in the first degree and his punishment assessed at imprisonment in the state prison during life.
The only error discussed in this appeal relates to the action of the court in denying his motion for a new trial. This motion, among other things, embraced several specifications of alleged errors upon the part of the court in giving and refusing instructions and admitting certain evidence and also in respect to the misconduct of counsel representing the State. The Attorney-General, in answering the arguments presented by counsel for appellant, strenuously insists that neither the instructions nor the evidence is properly before this court as a part of the record.
A review of the transcript discloses the following facts: On the 20th day of April, 1899, the trial court overruled the motion for a new trial and granted to appellant sixty days in which to prepare and file a bill of exceptions, and thereupon rendered judgment in accordance with the verdict of the jury. After this entry, on a day subsequent to the overruling of the motion for a new trial, the court, by an order duly entered of record, fixed June 20, 1899, as the limit of the time for filing a transcript of the evidence in the cause as prepared by the official shorthand reporter of the Sullivan Circuit Court. On June 12, 1899, the following entry appears: "Comes the defendant by counsel aforesaid and now files a general bill of exceptions." After this entry follows a document which first embraces a statement to the effect that Helen L. Hinkle was by the court duly appointed an official reporter and as such was duly qualified, etc., and that on the trial of said cause she, as such official reporter, took down in shorthand the oral evidence given in the cause and noted the rulings of the court in respect to the admission and rejection of evidence and the objections and exceptions thereto. A further recital or statement follows to the effect that said official reporter furnished a longhand transcript of her shorthand report of the evidence to the defendant and that said transcript was filed by her with the clerk of the Sullivan Circuit Court within the time fixed by that court. It is then recited that on the day of June, 1899, the judge of said court did attach to the transcript of the evidence a certificate that the same was correct and contained all of the evidence, and the further recital that, afterwards, this transcript of the evidence, so filed with the clerk, was "incorporated into this bill of exceptions and made a part of the record in this cause, which said longhand manuscript and transcript so filed by the reporter as aforesaid and the reporter's certificate thereto and the certificate of the judge thereto, constitute the following 234 pages, and the same is a verbatim report and is the original longhand manuscript of the evidence and the rulings and exceptions aforesaid, to wit." Next following after these recitals or statements appears an examination of a certain juror upon his voire dire and a statement to the effect that said juror was challenged for cause, and that said challenge was overruled and exception reserved to such ruling. Next follows what purports to be a longhand manuscript of the evidence. At the close of this manuscript appears a certificate of the official reporter in compliance with section five of an act of the legislature approved March 3, 1899. Acts 1899, p. 384. Indorsed upon this certificate is the certificate of the clerk of the lower court, whereby he certifies "that the within and foregoing transcript and shorthand manuscript" was filed in his office on June 1, 1899, before it had been incorporated into the bill of exceptions. Immediately after this certificate of the clerk is the following recital: "And be it further remembered that after the evidence in this cause had been closed and argument heard the court gave to the jury, of its own motion, instructions from one to twenty-seven both inclusive, which are in these words". Instructions numbered from one to twenty-seven, inclusive, given by the court, with exceptions to each, are set out. Following these latter instructions there appears a request upon the part of counsel for appellant for the court to give certain other instructions, set out, which appears to have been refused and exceptions noted. Next follows what is usually inserted at the close of a formal bill of exceptions, which shows the signing thereof by the trial judge on June 12, 1899. Immediately following this appears a certificate of the trial judge in these words: . After this follows the final certificate of the clerk of the court wherein it is again recited that a longhand transcript of the evidence was filed in his office on the date given and thereafter incorporated into a bill of exceptions.
The evident purpose of counsel for appellant was to have the longhand transcript of the evidence, as prepared and certified to and filed with the clerk by the official reporter, made a part of the record in this appeal in compliance with and according to the provisions of the act of 1899 heretofore cited. Previous to the passage by the legislature of an act approved March 8, 1897 (Acts 1897, p. 244), many appeals, both in this and in the Appellate Court, were not considered upon their merits, by reason of the failure to comply with the requirements of an act approved March 7, 1873, (Acts 1873, p. 194). This latter statute concerned the appointment by trial courts of shorthand reporters and provided for certifying in appeals the longhand manuscript of the original stenographic report of the evidence when the same had been filed with the clerk of the court and incorporated into a bill of exceptions. To simplify the procedure of bringing up the evidence on appeals, the legislature enacted the statute of 1897, supra. Under the provisions of this latter act, all that was necessary in appeals to bring the evidence given in a cause in the trial court to either the Supreme or Appellate Court, together with the rulings of the lower court in respect to the admission and rejection of evidence and the competency of witnesses and the exceptions thereto, was to incorporate all in a bill of exceptions and then file the same, as therein provided. It then became the duty of the clerk of the lower court, upon request of the appealing party, to embrace in the transcript such original bill of exceptions instead of a copy thereof. The taking down of the evidence and the noting of exceptions, under this latter act, is not limited to shorthand reporters to be appointed by the court, but such services may be performed by anyone, and there is no requirement that the evidence shall be first filed with the clerk before it can be incorporated into a bill of exceptions.
The settlement of the bill of exceptions, in respect to the correctness of the evidence therein incorporated, and that it contains all of the evidence given upon the trial of the cause, and in regard to the correct noting of exceptions, etc., is, under the act of 1897, properly lodged in the trial judge. Why any necessity should have arisen for a change of the procedure, as provided by the law of 1897, and thereby complicate and confuse that which had been so simplified, we are unable to conjecture.
The act of 1899, supra, is entitled "An act concerning the appointment of shorthand court reporters, * * * and providing that the original longhand manuscript may be used on appeal, repealing all laws in conflict therewith." The first section of this act declares that it shall be the duty of the judge of each circuit, criminal, or superior court, in each and every county, to appoint an official reporter whose duty it shall be, when required by the judge, to be present in court and take...
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