Anderson v. State
| Decision Date | 31 March 1888 |
| Citation | 24 Fla. 139,3 So. 884 |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
| Parties | ANDERSON v. STATE. |
Error to circuit court, Manatee county; H. L. MITCHELL, Judge.
Joseph C. Anderson was convicted of murder in the first degree, and on refusal of the court to grant a new trial, brings error.
Syllabus by the Court
If two parties have been engaged together in an offense, the confession of one of them, after the completion of the offense, is not allowable as evidence against the other. [1]
The corpus delicti may be proved as well by circumstances as by positive testimony.
Where there is evidence to sustain the verdict of a jury, this court will not disturb the action of the circuit court in refusing to grant a new trial, moved for on the ground that the verdict is not supported by the evidence.
COUNSEL Wall & Turman and E. M. Graham, for plaintiff in error.
The Attorney General, for defendant in error.
The plaintiff in error and one Charles B. Willard were convicted of murder in the first degree, and, on the jury's recomendation to mercy, were sentenced to the state penitentiary for life. The case is brought here--as his counsel advises the court,--solely to present the question whether the evidence was sufficient to justify the verdict. The error we are to consider is the refusal of the court to grant a new trial on that evidence. The indictment contains two counts essentially the same, except as to the parties who were alleged to be present aiding and abetting in the homicide; but plaintiff in error was one of those parties in both counts. The charge is, omitting formal allegations, that Willard, with a shotgun in his hands, on the 27th of December, 1884, killed Charles E. Abbe, by shooting him in the head, the death following instantly; that the killing was done from premeditated design; and that plaintiff in error was present aiding and abetting the act.
We find on a careful examination of the evidence that, both from the testimony and confession of Willard, it is shown that he did shoot and kill Abbe on the day specified, and that the killing was done under circumstances proving the premeditated design that constitutes murder under the law of this state. Then, we are to inquire whether it is shown that plaintiff in error aided and abetted therein. In this inquiry we will give no effect to the confession of Willard as to any fact in the case, that not being allowable, even if he implicated plaintiff in error; but this, it should be said, on behalf of plaintiff in error, is not done. 1 Greenl. Ev. § 233. There are three facts to be established, independent of the confession of Willard, in order to make a case of guilt against plaintiff in error, viz.: First, the killing of Abbe second, if that is established, the participation of plaintiff in error in the killing; and, third, if that participation is established, a premeditated design on his part to effect Abbe's death.
As to the first, Morehouse, a witness for the state, testified in substance that about 11 o'clock on the 27th of December 1884, he and Abbe were working on a boat, when a man came up who was introduced to him as Mr. Willard,--the same person then on trial. After a conversation of some 25 minutes, the man left. A short while afterwards Abbe and witness went to dinner. Abbe returned to the boat first, and when witness returned he found Abbe picking up his tools, saying they would work no more, but go to the house. This was between 1 and 2 o'clock. Witness, as he was returning from dinner, saw two men sitting on a log or pile of lumber in the rear of a store, called 'Bidwell's Store.' When he and Abbe arrived near the store on their way back to the house, Abbe, with his head bowed down, not looking up, was fired on. Witness saw two men 20 feet from a corner of the store, one of whom he recognized as Willard, but did not know who the other was. Willard had a double-barrel shot-gun raised to his face, which he fired at Abbe, who fell in his tracks 20 yards from where Willard was standing. Willard ordered witness to get away from there, to run for his life, and he did run. Looking back over his shoulder when he had gone 25 or 30 yards, he saw Willard go up to Abbe's body, and take hold of his heel or ankle, and drag him towards the store, out of the line of witness' sight. He gave no further testimony of importance on the subject of the killing, except that some time afterwards he was shown an old straw hat, which he recognized as the one Abbe was wearing at the time; and that, though living within three miles of the place, he had not seen Abbe since, (his testimony being given about six months after the event.) Mrs. Abbe, wife of Charles E. Abbe, last saw him about 1 o'clock, December 27, 1884, as he was going towards the bay, a half mile from where they lived. She heard two shots, and a short time after saw Morehouse coming. He was running, and he told her not to go; they would kill her. She ran to the bay as fast as she could, and saw blood on the ground, where Abbe was shot, and his old straw hat lying there. Bidwell's store was closed. She saw a trail leading in a south-westerly direction from the spot where the blood was; it was a fresh trail. She went down to the beach, and found Mr. Cunliff. The hat shown her she recognized as Abbe's, and the little round holes in it were not there when he left for the beach. Search has been made in the bushes, on the beach, and in every place, for Abbe's body--diligent search--from time to time. Watson, sheriff, went to the place where Abbe was said to have been killed about 2 o'clock the night of December 27, 1884, and found considerable quantity of blood, and a trail where it was very apparant a body had been dragged to the water's edge. The trail began from where the blood was found. The blood was less than 20 paces from Bidwell's store. When morning came he renewed his examination, and found tracks on the side of what was dragged, which were more distant--near the water's edge. There was blood on the trail from where it started to the water. The blood first seen had something in it resembling brain,--a white substance,--and these were mixed together with hairs that looked gray. The hairs resembled human hair. He found a hat lying near where he found the blood; and the holes in it he recognized as the same he saw in it there. Having often seen shot-holes, he would say if they were such they were made by buckshot. There was a considerable quantity of blood. It was clogged and covered eight or ten inches in diameter. Riggin, who accompanied Watson, testified about the same. Cunliff, who was found by Mrs. Abbe on the beach, when she ran down after the shooting, had seen a boat hoisting sail about 2 o'clock that day, and saw it leave to go across the bay, and when Mrs. Abbe came to him it was nearly across. Bay about a mile wide. There is no testimony except for the state, and nothing in the cross-examination of the witnesses which weakens the force of that condensed in the foregoing statement; and we think it shows beyond doubt that Abbe was killed on the 27th of December, 1884, by Willard. The fact that the body has not been found is sufficiently accounted for by the fresh trail leading from the place where he fell when shot to the waters of the bay near by, and by the departure of a boat across the bay soon afterwards. That trail was marked by blood all the way, and, in the absence of anything else to explain how it came there, the conclusion cannot be resisted that it was the blood of Abbe. If he was not dead, why has he not shown...
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