Cauley v. State

• Decision Date: 11 June 1891
• Citation: 92 Ala. 71,9 So. 456
• Parties: CAULEY v. STATE.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

9 So. 456

92 Ala. 71

CAULEY v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Alabama

June 11, 1891

Appeal from circuit court, Butler county; JOHN P. HUBBARD, Judge.

Tom Cauley, a negro, was indicted, tried, and convicted for living in a state of adultery with one Parthenia Grayson, a white woman, and sentenced to the penitentiary for three years. The evidence introduced for the state tended to show that the defendant was guilty of the charge preferred against him, while the testimony offered in his own behalf tended to show that he was not guilty as charged, and was in direct conflict with the state's evidence. There were but two exceptions reserved on the trial, and only two points urged in argument. The one, as to the introduction of the evidence of the defendant's character as to women, is sufficiently shown in the opinion. The other was the exception reserved by the defendant to the court's refusal to give the following written charge to the jury: "If the state's witness contradict herself, the jury may look to this in determining the credit to which she is entitled; and if she is contradicted by a witness who is unimpeached, and if such contradiction generates in the minds of the jury a reasonable doubt of guilt, then they must give the defendant the benefit of it, and acquit the defendant."

J M. Whitehead, for appellant.

W L. Martin, Atty. Gen., for the State.

COLEMAN J.

The defendant was convicted of the offense of miscegenation, and sentenced to the penitentiary for three years. During the trial the defendant introduced testimony to prove his general good character. On cross-examination, a witness was asked by the solicitor, "Do you know the general character of defendant about women, and, if so, what is that character?" The witness replied "that he did from what was said about it, and that his general character about women was, from what was said about it, that he was foolishly fond of women." The evidence was objected to by the defendant, and a motion to exclude it from the jury was overruled. General character is the reputation one has made in the community in which he resides,-the result of his general walk and conversation. It cannot be shown by proof of particular acts of good or bad conduct. What knowledge is necessary to render a witness prima facie competent to testify of good or bad character has been often passed upon in this state. Hussey v. State, 87 Ala. 121, 6 South. Rep. 420; Haley v. State, 63 Ala. 85; Childs v. State, 55 Ala. 29; Hadley v. State Id. 31, and references. Good character may generate a reasonable doubt, upon the principle that it is unlikely that a person of good character would commit the act charged. On cross-examination, or by other witnesses, testimony in rebuttal of that, tending to...