Com. v. Crowley

• Decision Date: 02 April 1896
• Citation: 43 N.E. 509,165 Mass. 569
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. CROWLEY.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

165 Mass. 569

43 N.E. 509

COMMONWEALTH v. CROWLEY.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

April 2, 1896

COUNSEL

John

D. McLaughlin, 2d Asst. Dist. Atty., for the Commonwealth.

W.H Baker, for defendant.

OPINION

FIELD C.J.

The indictment is for manslaughter, charging the defendant with killing John E. Burns, by stabbing him with a knife; and the defendant justified the homicide on the ground that he was acting in self-defense. There was evidence that Burns, in the saloon of one Jacobs, was the aggressor in an assault made upon the defendant's brother, a short time before the homicide complained of; and that, after Burns and the defendant's brother had been separated by the defendant and others, the defendant and his brother wished to get away and go home without being noticed by Burns; and that they were let out of the side door of the wholesale department of the saloon, by one Ward, for that purpose. There was also evidence that Burns followed the defendant and his brother or that he went out of his way to intercept them on their way home, and stood in a doorway, and that, when the defendant and his brother passed by, "he followed them, and the trouble began." The homicide occurred about 20 minutes after the defendant took the knife in the wholesale department of the saloon, and about half a mile distant from the saloon. The government put in evidence the fact that the defendant took the knife from the table in the saloon, and carried it away with him. As the indictment is for manslaughter, it may be assumed that the government conceded that the killing was in hot blood; but whether the defendant took the knife for the purpose of assaulting Burns if he could find him, or for the purpose of defending himself if Burns found and assaulted him, was material. It was competent for the defendant to show, not only that he had reasonable cause to believe that Burns would assault him, but that he actually believed it. There must be an actual apprehension on his part of an assault which would cause great bodily harm, as well as reasonable cause to apprehend such an assault, to justify him in arming himself with a dangerous weapon, for the purpose of using it in repelling the assault. The fight at the saloon and the homicide are not necessarily to be treated as two independent transactions. The evidence tended to show that they were, in effect, one continuing transaction, in the minds of Burns and of the defendant. See Com. v. Woodward, 102 Mass. 155.

The exceptions recite as follows: "The commonwealth offered as a witness said Ward, who testified, among other things, in direct examination, that the defendant spoke to him immediately before he let the brothers out of said door, but did not testify and was...