Bangren v. State
| Decision Date | 24 April 1944 |
| Docket Number | 35495. |
| Citation | 17 So.2d 599,196 Miss. 887 |
| Court | Mississippi Supreme Court |
| Parties | BANGREN v. STATE. |
Fred B. Smith, of Ripley, and G. C. Moreland, of Corinth, for appellant.
Greek L. Rice, Atty. Gen., and Geo. H. Ethridge, Asst. Atty. Gen for appellee.
The appellant was convicted of the crime of murder, was sentenced to life imprisonment in the state penitentiary, and has prosecuted this appeal.
After a visit to the room of Marlene McKee, a sixteen year old girl at the home of the appellant, Vernice Mae Bangren, in the City of Corinth, where young girls were permitted to come and have dates with men, one Gerald Wardlaw, a married man, was shot and killed by the said occupant of the house while she was attempting to eject him therefrom. Shortly prior to the shooting, the said Wardlaw had forcibly taken the sum of $3 from Marlene McKee immediately after having paid the same to her; thereupon an argument ensued in which the appellant also became involved and which resulted in Marlene McKee calling Wardlaw a "cheap son of a bitch" as he stood in the road or street in front of the house flourishing this money in his hand. The appellant then stated to Wardlaw "Since you have got your money how about you going on, I don't like your kind around here." Nevertheless, he then reentered the house and stated to the appellant that Marlene had better say that she was sorry for what she had said, whereupon the appellant required her to apologize to him and then commanded that he get out of the house and not come back any more. He replied that it was the first time that anyone had tried to tell him what to do or order him around, and that he had come back to tell her what to do. He then left, however, but presently returned, and, over the protest of the appellant, came into the front room where she and others were sitting.
Marlene McKee testified as a witness for the State that in the meantime the appellant had stated that if he came back she was going to kill the "damn son of a bitch." However, as he was again entering her home, the appellant made no attempt at that time to carry out this alleged threat, but thinking that he had perhaps left some of his supply of whiskey in the house, from which they all had been drinking, she made inquiry in that behalf, found that he had done so, caused the residue of whiskey to be delivered to him and again commanded that he leave the premises. One word then brought on another, and whereupon the appellant contends that Wardlaw started unbuttoning his shirt and that she said to him "you wouldn't pull off your shirt to hit a girl", and that he said "no", and "started drawing back"; that she knocked his lick off and reached in a chest of drawers, obtained her pistol so as to compel him to leave the house, and that he jerked her out onto the porch, where she shot him.
There is but little conflict in the testimony, since the state witness Marlene McKee had left the room before the shooting occurred and thereafter only heard the shooting and the appellant doing some cursing, except the conflict in regard to the threat which this witness said was made by the appellant about her intention to kill Wardlaw if he came back into the house the second time, one other witness for the state having repeatedly testified that the statement of the appellant to the effect that "I will kill the son of a bitch" was made immediately after the shots were fired and before he fell to the ground out in the road, and some of the witnesses not having heard such alleged threat at all.
Under the foregoing state of facts, it is contended on behalf of the appellant that since she had requested Wardlaw to leave her home and not return, and that he thereafter returned and refused again to leave after having been further told to do so, the appellant had a right under the law to use such force as may have reasonably appeared to be necessary to eject him from her home, and was therefore entitled to a directed verdict in her favor. But we are of the opinion that it was a question for the jury to determine whether or not she used more force than reasonably appeared to be necessary for that purpose, or whether on the other hand she killed Wardlaw in what reasonably appeared to be in her necessary self-defense, she having sought to justify the homicide on both of these grounds. However, we think that the trial court was in error in not limiting the issue for the jury to the question of manslaughter or justifiable homicide. While malice aforethought is a necessary element in the crime of murder, it does not always follow therefrom that the existence of actual malice at the time of the slaying would necessarily have the effect of rendering a particular homicide a case of murder. A person may be guilty only of manslaughter or justifiable homicide when slaying another even though the accused is mad and is bearing ill will toward his adversary at the time of the killing, if the act is done while resisting an attempt of the latter "to do any unlawful act, or after such attempt shall have failed," if such anger or ill will is engendered by the particular circumstances of the unlawful act then being attempted, or the commission of which is then thwarted, and is nonexistent prior thereto. Each case must depend upon its own facts and circumstances. To constitute murder, the malice must precede the unlawful act which is being attempted or committed by the person killed, where the killing is done in resisting his attempt to do an unlawful act. Williams v. State, 122 Miss. 151, 84 So. 8.
It is stated generally in 26 Am.Jur. 271, § 170, that: "The fact that the homicide is committed in preventing an unlawful entry into a dwelling may, where the circumstances are not such as to justify the act, reduce the degree of the crime of manslaughter." In the case at bar, even though it may be said that the appellant had extended an invitation for Wardlaw and ether men to visit her home, she would nevertheless have the right to revoke such...
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Wells v. State
...144 So. 230 (1932), a man attempted to attack a woman in her home and she shot him. The homicide was not murder. In Bangren v. State, 196 Miss. 887, 17 So.2d 599 (1944), this Court held that the killing of a mere trespasser in an assignation house was not murder, and that the trial court sh......
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...Each case must depend upon its own facts and circumstances. Harrell v. State, 218 So.2d at 886 (Miss.1969)(citing Bangren v. State, 196 Miss. 887, 897, 17 So.2d 599, 600 (1944)). ¶ 15. "Heat of passion" manslaughter requires the absence of malice. Miss.Code Ann. § 97-3-35 (1994). This Court......
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Stennis v. State, 45819
...the hands of his assailant. Blackwell v. State, 44 So.2d 409 (Miss.1950); Howard v. State, 18 So.2d 148 (Miss.1944); Bangren v. State, 196 Miss. 887, 17 So.2d 599 (1944). All of these material issues of fact as to whether or not appellant acted in necessary self-defense to save his life or ......
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...committed with deliberate design, i.e., malice aforethought. Taylor v. State, 452 So.2d 441, 443 (Miss.1984); Bangren v. State, 196 Miss. 887, 897, 17 So.2d 599, 600 (1944). By way of contrast, the type of manslaughter at issue here requires an affirmative showing of a killing in the heat o......