Commonwealth v. McClanahan

• Decision Date: 25 April 1913
• Citation: 153 Ky. 412,155 S.W. 1131
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. McCLANAHAN.
• Court: Kentucky Court of Appeals

155 S.W. 1131

153 Ky. 412

COMMONWEALTH v. McCLANAHAN.

Court of Appeals of Kentucky.

April 25, 1913

Appeal from Circuit Court, Campbell County.

Sterling McClanahan was convicted of housebreaking. To review alleged errors in rulings of the trial court, the Commonwealth appeals. Ruling affirmed, and opinion certified to the trial court.

James Garnett, Atty. Gen., and M. M. Logan, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the Commonwealth.

SETTLE J.

Notwithstanding its success in convicting appellee of housebreaking under an indictment charging him with that crime, appellant commonwealth of Kentucky, being dissatisfied with the ruling of the circuit court in excluding certain evidence offered by it on the trial of an alleged confession of his guilt made by appellee, by this appeal seeks a review by us of that ruling.

The evidence in question consisted of a conversation or conversations had with appellee by J. B. Sheeran, a detective and police officer of the city of Newport, after the arrest of the former, and while he was in the custody of that officer. When objection was made to the evidence of Sheeran the trial court required the jury to be taken from the room in charge of the sheriff, and in their absence had the detective state the conversation he had with appellee, which was thereupon declared incompetent by the court, and not permitted to go to the jury, to which the commonwealth at the time excepted. The conversation occurred in the presence of Sheeran's partner, Cottingham, and was in part heard by Lieutenant Bloomfield of the city police force.

It appears from the record that appellee was jointly indicted with one Omer Norman for feloniously breaking into and stealing from the office of the Crystal Ice Company $64 in money; also that appellee at the time Sheeran talked with him was under arrest for disorderly conduct, of which he was guilty, while riding in an automobile which he had rented, and that Sheeran, because of information he had received as to appellee's having been seen about the Ice Company's premises and as to the well-known pecuniary inability of appellee to hire an automobile and his bad reputation, was led to suspect that he had obtained the money with which to hire the automobile by stealing it from the office of the Crystal Ice Company; therefore, in following out the supposed clue thus obtained, Sheeran proceeded to interview and question appellee for the purpose of ascertaining whether he was guilty of the housebreaking referred to. The conversation in which appellee made the alleged confession was held in what was known as the "detective room" after he had been confronted by Norman, and resulted in a full confession from appellee of his guilt of the housebreaking and Norman's participation therein. The testimony of Sheeran as to the questions he put to appellee and the answers of the latter thereto, together with his explanation of the means employed to obtain the confession, take up 12 pages of the bill of evidence, for which reason it cannot be reproduced in the opinion without unduly extending its length.

It is apparent from Sheeran's testimony that he set out to procure from appellee a confession of his guilt, and his first step was to obtain from him, by questioning him, certain statements to the effect that one Conoth, who had been arrested with him, had hired the automobile. He then interviewed Conoth who contradicted the statements of the appellee, which contradiction Sheeran immediately reported to appellee. This was followed by a continuation of his interrogation of him until he got from him the statement that he had himself hired the automobile at the price of $3, and had obtained the money by selling some furniture. Thereupon Sheeran told him he could not have hired the automobile at such a low price. In the course of the conversation Sheeran informed appellee of some one breaking into the Crystal Ice Company's office and the taking of the money therefrom, and asked him if he did it; appellee then denied that he had done so, but later admitted it after being contradicted in the manner indicated. It was denied by Sheeran that he made to appellee any promise or offered him any reward to induce the confession of his guilt, or that it was made as the result of threats or coercion from him.

Evidence as to the confession thus obtained of appellee was excluded by the trial court on the ground that its inadmissibility is declared by an act of the Legislature, approved March 19, 1912, entitled "An act to prevent sweating process of prisoners arrested charged with crime, and to prevent the admission as evidence of confessions obtained by such process in the state of Kentucky," which provides:

"(1) That what is

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