Cartwright v. State

Citation14 So. 526,71 Miss. 82
CourtUnited States State Supreme Court of Mississippi
Decision Date20 November 1893
PartiesJACK CARTWRIGHT v. THE STATE

FROM the circuit court of the first district of Hinds county, HON J. B. CHRISMAN, Judge.

Jack and Ed Cartwright, alias Swanson, were jointly indicted for the murder of Clif Hines, a policeman, in the city of Jackson. The evidence disclosed that the accused had come to Jackson only a few days before the homicide, and had taken up their temporary abode in a vacant and untenantable house in the suburbs of the city. Hines, accompanied by another policeman, Walker Guice, went to the house for the purpose of arresting the Cartwrights as suspicious characters. While at or near the house, both Hines and Guice were shot and killed. The theory of the state was that the Cartwrights fired upon the policemen to avoid arrest, and that the policemen had made no hostile demonstrations evidencing a purpose to fire upon the accused. The theory of the defense was that the policemen fired the first shot, and were shot and killed by appellant, Jack Swanson, acting in self-defense. The evidence as to the circumstances attending the killing was conflicting, there being testimony to support both the contention of the state and that of the defense; but, as the opinion is limited to a consideration of specific errors assigned, it is not necessary to set out all the evidence.

On the trial the state, over the objection of the defendants introduced evidence to show that defendant, Jack Cartwright had killed a man in the state of Tennessee about eighteen months before, and that he and his brother, Ed, who was charged with complicity, had been indicted for murder, and had fled from that state. This evidence the court allowed to be introduced as tending to show a probable motive on the part of the accused, and the jury was instructed to consider the evidence only as affecting the question of motive.

In making the closing argument for the state, the prosecuting attorney characterized the accused as murderers and fugitives from justice, and spoke of their hands being red with the blood of a fellow-man, and the use of this language was made one of the grounds upon which a new trial was asked.

Ed Cartwright was acquitted, but a verdict of guilty of manslaughter was rendered against Jack Cartwright, and he appeals. The opinion contains a further statement of the facts touching the questions decided.

Reversed and remanded.

W. R. Harper and C. H. Alexander, for appellant.

1. The argument of the prosecuting attorney in characterizing accused as murderers and fugitives, whose hands were red with blood, was directly in the face of the instruction that the former killing was evidence only to show a probable motive. Such remarks were peculiarly prejudicial under the facts in evidence. After being made, no objection by the defense could avail. Objection would have merely emphasized the effectiveness of the comment.

2. No evidence was offered by the state to explain the misconduct of the jury in separating. That, with the fact that the jurors perused daily papers containing partisan reports of the trial and comments bitterly hostile to the accused, must necessitate a reversal. Thompson, Merriam on Juries, § 351 and cases cited.

Frank Johnston, attorney-general for the state.

1. The comments of the counsel for the state, if improper, were not objected to at the time. Besides, the verdict is so clearly correct, that slight errors should not cause a reversal.

2. I submit that there is no sufficient evidence that the jurors who were in possession of the newspapers read reports of the trial, and were influenced by them. It devolves on the accused to show, not merely a possibility of improper influences being exerted, but that the misconduct of the jury was such that prejudice to the accused must be presumed to have resulted.

OPINION

WOODS, J.

The errors complained of in the first and second assignments, if errors they were, need not be considered. They proved harmless, for the action of the jury in acquitting one of ...

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