Chiles v. State

• Decision Date: 04 November 1925
• Docket Number: (No. 9416.)
• Citation: 276 S.W. 1105
• Parties: CHILES v. STATE.
• Court: Texas Court of Criminal Appeals

276 S.W. 1105

CHILES v. STATE.

(No. 9416.)

Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.

November 4, 1925.

Appeal from District Court, Lamar County; R. L. Lattimore, Special Judge.

Odell Chiles was convicted for theft of an automobile, and he appeals. Affirmed.

Aaron Sturgeon and H. B. Birmingham, both of Paris, for appellant.

Sam D. Stinson, State's Atty., of Greenville, and Nat Gentry, Jr., Asst. State's Atty., of Tyler, for the State.

HAWKINS, J.

Conviction is for the theft of an automobile. Punishment is three years in the penitentiary.

The evidence shows that appellant, with eight other parties, were confined in the jail of Lamar county. They effected an escape. Appellant, with four others, then took an automobile from the street and drove it into the state of Arkansas, where they attempted to sell it. Learning that suspicion had been aroused in the mind of the party with whom they were negotiating, they drove the car some distance farther and abandoned it. A few days later appellant and others who escaped with him were captured and the automobile recovered.

Over objection the court permitted proof that appellant was being held in jail on a charge of murder, and that the other prisoners who escaped with him were charged with various offenses ranging from murder to violations of the liquor law. The bill complaining of this matter bears explanation of the learned trial judge that he admitted such evidence in support of the state's theory that appellant had no intention of returning the car to the owner, it being appellant's contention that at the time the car was taken he entertained no fraudulent intent to steal it, and that, if a fraudulent intent to appropriate it to his own use was afterwards formed, it would not constitute theft. These questions were submitted to the jury for solution. To aid them in this respect we think no error was committed in receiving the evidence complained of. See Welk v. State, 99 Tex. Cr. R. 235, 265 S. W. 914, and cases cited therein; also see authorities collated under section 166, Branch's Ann. Tex. Penal Code.

Complaint is made because the court permitted the state to reopen the case and introduce other testimony. The state proved that appellant had testified in the trial of another case that he and others "had all stolen the car together." No objection was interposed to this testimony at the time it was introduced. The state then rested its case. After this was done, appellant urged objection to the evidence...