Com. v. Williams

• Decision Date: 23 June 1898
• Citation: 50 N.E. 1035,171 Mass. 461
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. WILLIAMS.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

171 Mass. 461

50 N.E. 1035

COMMONWEALTH v. WILLIAMS.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Essex.

June 23, 1898

COUNSEL

Alden P. White, Dist. Atty., for the Commonwealth.

C.A Sayward and N.N. Jones, for defendant.

OPINION

HOLMES J.

Evidence which is colorless taken by itself, which establishes neither a constituent nor a fact pointing by inference to a constituent of a crime, may be made significant by other evidence, and so may be made admissible. It need not be self-justifying without regard to the other circumstances proved. Com. v. O'Neil, 169 Mass. 394, 48 N.E 134. What is true of any part of the evidence is true with regard to the whole of it. And it also is true, in this commonwealth at least, that there is no one dominant part of the case which must be proved as directly as possible in the nature of things before evidence of a remoter kind is admissible to connect the defendant with the supposed crime. No doubt, the jury ought to be very sure that a crime has been committed before they convict a person of having committed it. But, even upon an indictment for murder, the evidence of the death, as well as of every other material fact, may be insufficient singly, and yet together may leave no reasonable doubt of the crime or the defendant's guilt. The facts in a circle support each other, when, if any one were withdrawn, they all would fall to the ground. State v. Williams, 52 N.C. 446; Campbell v. People, 159 Ill. 9, 42 N.E. 123; State v. Martin, 47 S.C. 67, 25 S.E. 889; Com v. Johnson, 162 Pa.St. 63, 29 A. 280; U.S. v. Williams, 1 Cliff. 5, 21, Fed.Cas.No.16,707; Laughlin v. Com. (Ky.) 37 S.W. 590. See Com. v. Webster, 5 Cush. 295, 310, and more especially Bemis' Report of the Trial, 479, 480. Other cases are collected in 7 Am. & Eng.Enc.Law (2d Ed.) 863, 864, tit. "Corpus Delicti."

The case at bar is a striking example and proof of the foregoing general rules. Early in the morning of July 28, 1897, the house of Gallo, the man alleged to have been murdered, was burned down. The remains of a human body of uncertain sex were found in the ruins. If we leave on one side the evidence bearing on the other issues of the case, there was no identification of the body otherwise than by the place where it was found, by the fact that Gallo had been seen at his house the previous evening, and was seen no more, and by a clasp of a pocketbook like Gallo's found near the remains. There was no direct evidence of the commission of a crime. Yet the other evidence, taken with the facts just mentioned, warranted the jury in finding it proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Gallo was murdered, and was murdered by the defendant.

At about a quarter past 4 in the morning, about the time that the fire was discovered, the defendant appeared two and seven-tenths miles away, at the Carleton House, in the town of Wakefield, heated, flushed, and excited, with bloodstains upon him, his hat gone, and his clothing disturbed, and told a story which subsequent investigation did not confirm,--that he had been attacked and robbed of a gold watch by the side of a pond which he naturally would have passed in coming from Gallo's house. Tracks of a running man were found going from Gallo's house in the direction of a path leading to the pond. On the day before the fire, the defendant was penniless, and wanting money to go to Klondike. In telling of the robbery, he said that he had sent for $75, and was glad he had not received it. At 9 o'clock on the same morning he said that he sent for $200, and expected to hear before Saturday. At 10 o'clock he produced a roll of bills from which he took one of $5, and spent the greater part of it. On the evening of the same day, after telling different stories to the police, when about to be searched, he produced a roll of five $10 and four $5 bills, which at first he said his brother had sent to him by mail, and then declared that he found by the pond where he was assaulted as he was coming down. Upon an officer pressing him further, he turned very white, perspired, and hardly could speak for a time, but persisted that he found the money as he said. Then the officers searched his room, and found very bloody clothing, and two secreted $20 gold pieces, of which at first the defendant denied knowledge, but which afterwards he said he found with the rest. It appeared that Gallo had had three $20 gold pieces, and some time before had been paid $109, mostly in...