Cook v. State

• Decision Date: 02 July 1907
• Citation: 152 Ala. 66,44 So. 549
• Parties: COOK v. STATE.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

44 So. 549

152 Ala. 66

COOK v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Alabama

July 2, 1907

Appeal from Circuit Court, Henry County; H. A. Pearce, Judge.

Stovall Cook was convicted of carrying a concealed weapon, and he appeals. Reversed and remanded.

Upon trial the state was permitted to show over the objection of the defendant that defendant and a state's witness had a difficulty along the public road, that in said difficulty defendant drew his knife on witness, and that witness went for a stick and defendant put up his knife and took his pistol out of his pocket, and that witness did not see the pistol until he took it out of his pocket. Some question was asked him concerning the land suit between defendant and state's witness and the ill will growing therefrom. On redirect the solicitor asked the witness, over the objection of plaintiff, if he did not stop the defendant to talk to him about defendant's having carried or decoyed witness' boy off to Georgia. Impeaching witnesses were introduced as to the state's witness Cook, and testified that he had made certain statements, which he had denied having made while being examined as a witness. The witness was then asked, over the objection of defendant, if Lewis Williams was dead. It was later developed that said Williams was a short distance off at the time the difficulty occurred between defendant and the state's witness at the time it was alleged the pistol was drawn. In his argument to the jury the solicitor said: "The negro Will Anderson should not be believed in preference to the witness Joe Cook, because the predicate laid to Anderson put in his mouth what to testify to." The defendant was convicted, and appeals.

W. L Lee, for appellant.

Alexander M. Garber, Atty. Gen., for the State.

McCLELLAN J.

The defendant was convicted of the offense of carrying a concealed weapon. Over objection, the state was permitted to elicit from its witness the details of a difficulty in connection with which the alleged concealed weapon was shown and later again concealed. This was error to reversal. Gainey's Case, 141 Ala. 72, 37 So. 355.

There is no merit in the other exceptions reserved. The simple proof of the death of a person present on the occasion in question could not possibly have resulted in injury to defendant. Nor was the testimony, the purpose of which was to show bias, prejudice, or unfriendly state of feeling on the part of the witness testifying for ...