Amos v. State

• Decision Date: 27 July 1892
• Citation: 96 Ala. 120,11 So. 424
• Parties: AMOS v. STATE.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

11 So. 424

96 Ala. 120

AMOS v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Alabama

July 27, 1892

Appeal from circuit court, De Kalb county; JOHN P. TALLY, Judge.

Indictment of Rube Amos for murder. From a judgment of conviction defendant appeals. Reversed.

The bill of exceptions states that "in organizing the jury for the trial of this cause, one J. W. Rush was called and sworn, and answered all the questions as to his competency except that he said he did not know whether he lived in De Kalb county or not; that he lived near where they said the county line was, but he did not know where the line was, or whether he lived in Jackson or De Kalb county; that he claimed De Kalb county, and had been living there and voting in De Kalb county for ten years." The bill of exceptions then recites: "When the organization of the jury was completed, the defendant had not exhausted his peremptory challenges, and had seven remaining." The defendant insisted that Rush was not a competent juror, and challenged said juror for cause. The court overruled said challenge, and put the said juror on the defendant; and to this ruling of the court the defendant duly excepted, and defendant challenged said juror peremptorily." The state introduced evidence tending to show that the defendant went to an old outhouse where the deceased, Will Fuller, and a woman, Liz Regan, were, and while there became involved in an encounter, in which the defendant killed the said Will Fuller by cutting him with a knife. The testimony for the defendant tended to show that, upon going to said house, and after complaining to the said Fuller about his trespassing upon the things which had belonged to his dead wife, he warned him not to do so again; that the said Fuller, who was sitting in the house with a gun across his lap, got between the defendant and the door of the said house, leveled his gun upon the defendant, saying, "D______n you! I'll kill you;" that he knocked up the gun, and as it went off he was shot in the hand; that thereupon he, the defendant, got into a scuffle with Fuller and cut him. Dr. Roden was the first witness introduced by the state, and, after testifying as an expert as to the character of the wounds inflicted upon the deceased, he stated, in answer to questions asked him that he knew the general character of the deceased in the neighborhood in which he lived; and defendant's counsel asked the said witness the following questions: "Is his character good or bad?" "What was the character of Will Fuller for being a fighting man?" "What was Will Fuller's character as a fussy, bloodthirsty man?" "Is it not a fact that Will Fuller was known in that community as a desperate, bloodthirsty, fighting man?" The state by its counsel separately objected to each one of these questions, the court sustained each objection, and the defendant separately excepted. The bill of exceptions then states "that later in the progress of the trial the defendant was allowed to introduce the evidence sought to be elicited by the several foregoing questions." Upon the introduction of one Bates as a witness for the state, after testifying that the defendant Rube Amos, Bud Amos, and Tobe Amos passed by his house, and told him that Rube Amos had hurt Will Fuller very badly, the solicitor asked the following question: "Did either one of the other Amoses [meaning Bud or Tobe] have anything?" The defendant objected to this question as being illegal and irrelevant. The court overruled his objection, and the defendant duly excepted. Said witness then answered that Bud Amos was "toting a chopping axe." On the cross-examination of the witness Slayton, the defendant asked the said witness the following question: If Liz Regan was a known prostitute. The state objected to this question, the court sustained the objection, and the defendant duly excepted. On the cross-examination of the witness Upton, who was introduced as a witness for the defendant, and after having testified that he met Will Fuller, deceased, in the woods the night before they went to the house of Ben Amos, where the trespass complained of by the defendant was committed, the solicitor asked the said witness this question. "Was it not at a still you met said Fuller?" The defendant objected to this question the court overruled the objection, and the defendant excepted. Upon the further cross-examination of this witness the state asked him several questions which pertained to his individual conduct, in reference to which neither the said Will Fuller nor the defendant had any connection. The court overruled the defendant's objections to these several questions, and the defendant separately excepted to each ruling. After the introduction of all the testimony, the defendant requested the court to give the following written charges to the jury, and separately excepted to the court's refusal to give each of them as asked: (1) "The court charges the jury that the defendant had the right to peaceably go to the old house where Will Fuller was, and warn him not to enter into his house or upon his dead wife's things; and if the jury are satisfied, from all the evidence, that he did nothing more, and that Will Fuller assaulted him with a gun, and there was an apparent necessity to strike in self-defense, he had the right to do so, even though death ensue." (2) "The court charges the jury that, when an unlawful and violent attack is made on one, which reasonably indicates that serious bodily injury is about to be inflicted, the...