Angelo v. People of State
| Decision Date | 30 September 1880 |
| Citation | 36 Am.Rep. 132,96 Ill. 209,1880 WL 10095 |
| Parties | THEODORE ANGELOv.THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS. |
| Court | Illinois Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
WRIT OF ERROR to the Circuit Court of Morgan county; the Hon. CYRUS EPLER, Judge, presiding.
Messrs. MORRISON, WHITLOCK & LIPPINCOTT, for the plaintiff in error:
We insist that there was no evidence to justify the verdict. The plaintiff in error is a mere child, and at the time of the homicide was only a little over eleven years old, and was prima facie incapable of committing a crime. Rev. Stat. 1874, p. 394, sec. 282. After arriving at the age of fourteen years he is presumed to be of sound mind, but before that time the burden of proof of sound mind, or knowledge of the distinction between good and evil, is on the People. 1 Russ. on Crimes, 2. Says this author: “On the attainment of fourteen years of age the criminal actions of infants are subject to the same modes of construction as those of the rest of society, for the law presumes them at those years to be dola capaces, and able to discern between good and evil, and therefore subjects them to capital punishments as much as if they were of full age; but during the interval between fourteen years and seven (ten under our statute, Rev. Stat. 1874, p. 394, sec. 283) an infant shall be prima facie and deemed doli incapax, and presumed to be unacquainted with guilt.”
See, also, 1 Bishop Criminal Law, secs. 284, 285 and 285a. Says the author:
We search the record in this case in vain for one word of proof of the malice or capacity of the boy. Nothing is disclosed as to him except the fact that he accompanied his blind and insane father, and, of course, was the constant listener to those unnatural stories of the number of men killed at his house, as detailed by the witnesses. Under our statute an infant under ten years is incapable of committing crime. From ten to fourteen he is prima facie incapable, and during the period last named the same burden is on the People to prove his capability as to prove any other material fact. It must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. The fact can be no more inferred, without evidence, than can any other material fact. It must be proved by competent evidence. This child was a little over eleven years of age, near the borders of legal incapacity, and the presumptions are relatively stronger that he is incapable of crime. See Bishop, supra.
At the August term, 1878, of the Morgan circuit court, the grand jury presented an indictment against John Angelo, then about seventy-eight years of age, and his son, Theodore Angelo, about eleven years of age, for the murder of Isaac Hammill. A trial was had at the following November term of the court, resulting in the acquittal of John, on the ground of insanity, and the conviction of Theodore of manslaughter, and the jury fixed the term of his imprisonment in the penitentiary at six years. A motion for a new trial by Theodore was entered, but overruled by the court, and he was sentenced to the Reform School for four years; and he prosecutes error, and brings the record to this court, and urges a reversal, on several grounds.
The statute has provided, by section 282 of the Criminal Code, that a person shall be considered of sound mind who is neither an idiot nor lunatic, nor affected with insanity, and who has arrived at the age of fourteen, or before that age if such person knows the distinction between good and evil. The 283d section provides that an infant under ten years of age shall not be found guilty of any crime or misdemeanor.
In Great Britain the lowest possible period fixed by law at which an infant could be convicted for a crime, was seven, whilst our statute has fixed the period at ten years. In both countries fourteen is the period after which the law presumes capacity, without proof of knowledge of good and evil.
Blackstone, vol. 4, p. 23, says: “Under seven years of age, indeed, an infant can not be guilty of felony; for then a feloneous discretion is almost an impossibility in nature.” He further says that convictions have been had of infants between seven and fourteen;--“But in all such cases the evidence of that malice which is to...
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