Allbritton v. State

• Decision Date: 07 January 1892
• Citation: 10 So. 426,94 Ala. 76
• Parties: ALLBRITTON v. STATE. CAFFEY v. SAME.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

10 So. 426

94 Ala. 76

ALLBRITTON v. STATE.

CAFFEY v. SAME.

Supreme Court of Alabama

January 7, 1892

Appeal from city court of Montgomery; T. M. ARRINGTON, Judge.

John Allbritton and Willis Caffey were separately indicted and tried for wantonly and maliciously throwing a stone or rock into a passenger-car of a railroad train. The state's evidence tended to show that the defendants were guilty as charged in the indictment. The defendants "introduced evidence to show an alibi." Both defendants were convicted, and now appeal; both cases being submitted together. Reversed.

Sayre & Pearson, for appellants.

Wm. L. Martin, Atty. Gen., for the State.

CLOPTON J.

At the instance of the prosecution the court gave, in each of these cases, the following charge: "An unsuccessful attempt to prove an alibi is always a circumstance of great weight against the prisoner." Speaking in reference to this statement of the principle, in Burrill, Circ. Ev. 519 as quoted from Wills, and from which the charge is copied, it is said in Porter v. State, 55 Ala. 95: "We are inclined to think Mr. Burrill states the principle too strongly. We cannot perceive why a failure in an attempted proof of alibi should be visited with severer intendments than a failure in the attempt to prove any other fact in defense. Of course, a fraudulent attempt to prove a simulated alibi, sustained by perjury, will, when detected, be a circumstance of great weight against the prisoner. The connection in which Burrill employs the expression above copied tends to show that he had reference to an unsuccessful fraudulent attempt to establish an alibi. In that sense, we agree with him." An alibi is not, in the strict and accurate sense, a special defense, but a traverse of the material averment in the indictment that the defendant did, or participated in the particular act charged, and is comprehended in the general plea, "Not guilty." Because susceptible of easy fabrication, and often attempted to be sustained by perjury, whereby the accused endeavors to break the net-work of facts and circumstances surely bringing him to conviction and punishment, the proof of an alibi is, and should be, subjected to careful scrutiny; but it is an error to assume that the law looks on such attempt with suspicion. A general prejudice against such attempt, it must be admitted, has resulted from the unquestioned fact that an alibi is often forged, constituting an artifice or contrivance to shield the guilty. Such proof, however, is positive evidence, which, when founded in truth, negatives the defendant's presence at the time and place of the crime, and disproves the prima facie case made by the prosecution. In some cases it is the only resort accessible to the innocent for the protection against a false accusation; and, though subjected to more rigid scrutiny, should receive from the jury the same consideration as any other evidence offered in denial or excuse. Being a defense which may be lawfully made, and which in legal contemplation is of the same favor as other lawful defenses, there can be no rule of law, founded on logic or principle, common sense or justice, which recognizes a distinction between the consequent weight of an unsuccessful attempt to establish an alibi, and of an unsuccessful attempt to prove any...