Ash v. State
| Decision Date | 23 February 1887 |
| Citation | 1 So. 558,81 Ala. 76 |
| Parties | ASH v. STATE. |
| Court | Alabama Supreme Court |
Appeal from circuit court, St. Clair county.
Indictment for conveying instrument into county jail to aid felon to escape.
The appellant was tried and convicted October 6, 1886, under an indictment for conveying into the county jail of St. Clair county a "horseshoe rasp," to aid one Jasper Towns a prisoner lawfully confined in said jail on a charge of burglary, to escape. The evidence showed that said Towns not only consented to and procured the act to be done, but aided and participated in it, by taking the said instrument from appellant in through a hole in the wire screen covering the window of his cell. It was also shown that George Barclay Jasper Shepherd, Zed. Thomas, and Marion Coker were prisoners in said jail at said time under charges of felony, and that they and said Towns all used said instrument to effect an escape, but failed. Said Towns and the four other prisoners above named were introduced as witnesses by the state, and their testimony tended to establish appellant's guilt of the offense charged.
In the general charge to the jury, the court, among other things instructed the jury "that, the defendant being indicted for conveying into the jail a horseshoe rasp, with the intent to facilitate the escape of Jasper Towns, one of the witnesses examined on the trial, the said Jasper Towns cannot under the law be and is not an accomplice with the defendant in the crime charged in this indictment, even though the jury should believe from the evidence that Jasper Towns assisted the defendant in conveying into the jail the horseshoe rasp with the intent to facilitate his own (Jasper Towns') escape." To this charge the appellant excepted. The court further instructed the jury "that, while it is true that a conviction cannot be had in this case on the uncorroborated testimony of an accomplice or accomplices in the crime for which the defendant is being tried, yet if there is evidence in the case of a witness or witnesses who are not accomplices, corroborating the testimony of accomplices, and tending to show that the defendant committed the crime, and such corroborating evidence satisfies the jury that the testimony of the accomplices is true, and if, from the whole evidence, the jury are satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty of the crime charged in the indictment, they should convict him." To this charge appellant excepted. The court further charged "that, in order to convict the defendant, it is only necessary that there should be testimony of witnesses who are not accomplices, sufficient, by way of corroboration and tending to connect the defendant with the commission of the crime, to satisfy the jury that witnesses who are accomplices in the crime...
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...whether the witness could have been charged with the same offense as the defendant, either as a principal or an accessory. Ash v. State, 81 Ala. 76, 1 So. 558 (1887); Curry v. State, 502 So.2d 836, 841-842 (Ala.Crim.App.1986). The short legal answer to this claim is that there is no constit......
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