Brown v. State

• Decision Date: 25 February 1901
• Citation: Brown v. State, 78 Miss. 637, 29 So. 519 (Miss. 1901)
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: JONAH BROWN v. STATE OF MISSISSIPPI

29 So. 519

78 Miss. 637

JONAH BROWN v. STATE OF MISSISSIPPI

Supreme Court of Mississippi

February 25, 1901

FROM the circuit court of Harrison county. HON. THADDEUS A. WOOD Judge.

Brown the appellant, was indicted for the murder of one Harden convicted of manslaughter, and appealed to the supreme court. The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.

Judgment reversed and case remanded.

W. H. Maybin, for appellant.

The admission of the testimony of witnesses, Seal and Duckworth, over appellant's objection, was error. The statements of the decedent certainly were no part of the res gestae of the homicide; they were made several hours after the conflict and were narratives of past events. They could not be introduced as dying declarations, for there was nothing to show that the declarant was under a sense of impending death. The statements themselves absolutely negatived the idea. The defendant's statements were not confessions, but denials of guilt. Peak v. State, 50 N. J. L., 222; Digby v. People, 113 Ill. 125.

Monroe McClurg, attorney-general, for appellee.

Appellant was so clearly and manifestly guilty of manslaughter, if not of murder, that he ought to rejoice at the result reached in the court below. The jury could not have been more merciful, and would have been well warranted, from the evidence, in convicting of murder. The instructions were all correct, and gave the law most liberally for appellant. The case was made out without the testimony of witnesses Duckworth and Seal, and the conviction ought not to be reversed.

OPINION

TERRAL, J.

Jonah Brown, with two others, was indicted in the circuit court of Harrison county for the murder of Syd Harden, and being separately tried for said offense, was convicted of manslaughter. Upon his trial threats made by him against the life of Harden were given in evidence. In addition to the threats, Susan Camp testified that she lived in the immediate neighborhood of the homicide, and that she heard three shots fired, and that they (meaning, of course, more than one) passed in front of her gate, when she heard the defendant say, "Did you see that nigger jump when I shot him?"

Judge Seal and Officer Duckworth were severally put upon the stand, and each testified before the court and jury that having arrested the defendant, they carried him to the house where Harden was lying wounded and asked him if he knew Brown, when Harden accused Brown of shooting him and of shooting him for nothing, and that Brown denied the accusation.

Brown was shot in the evening, about dusk, or between seven and eight o'clock, and Officer Duckworth and Justice of the Peace Seal, according to the evidence of Duckworth, had this interview with Harden in the presence of Brown, about half an hour or three-quarters of an hour after the shooting of Harden. After...