Coulter v. State
| Decision Date | 06 November 1911 |
| Citation | 140 S.W. 719,100 Ark. 561 |
| Parties | COULTER v. STATE |
| Court | Arkansas Supreme Court |
Appeal from Sevier Circuit Court; J. T. Cowling, Judge; affirmed.
Judgment affirmed.
(No brief was filed for appellant.)
Hal L Norwood, Attorney-General, and William H. Rector, Assistant for appellee.
The defendant, Jim Coulter, was indicted for the crime of murder in the second degree, charged with killing one Burton Coulter. He was convicted of manslaughter, and sentenced to the State penitentiary for a period of two years. In his motion for a new trial a number of errors are assigned why the judgment should be reversed. After a careful examination of this case, we think that the only errors assigned which are of sufficient importance to be noted in this opinion relate to the rulings of the court relative to certain testimony and to certain instructions.
The defendant and the deceased were brothers, and on the night of December 24, 1910, went together to a colored church, where a "festival" was in progress. It appears that both the defendant and deceased had been drinking intoxicating liquors, and probably to some extent were under their influence. Soon after they got to the church, the deceased became rather boisterous, and, walking up the aisle exclaimed that he could whip twenty men. The defendant then left the church, and the deceased followed him, and, after going a short distance, they began to quarrel, and, as one of the witnesses expressed it, "got into a racket." The testimony upon the part of the State tended to prove that they then proceeded a few steps further, when another brother named Dow and a nephew came to them and requested the deceased to go back to the church. The deceased told them to go on to the church, and that he and defendant would follow. The brother Dow then began reproving them for their unbrotherly and boisterous conduct, and the deceased then began crying, and requested defendant to come to him and talk with him. Deceased then walked up to him, and told him that he did not have anything against him, and defendant said, "Yes, you have, Burt." Thereupon, deceased said: "If you think I have, then here is my gun," and handed him his pistol. About this time, the nephew stepped up to the defendant and said: "There ain't anybody going to run over little Jim," meaning the defendant. The deceased then asked for his gun, and, seeing that it was his nephew who had spoken, he said he did not need his gun for him, but could fight him from the shoulder, and began pulling off his coat. While he was pulling off his coat, the defendant pulled his pistol from his pocket, and fired it at deceased, exclaiming, "Now die, damn you!"
The shot took effect in the head of the deceased, resulting in his death shortly thereafter. Immediately after firing the fatal shot, defendant went to the church, which was only a short distance away, and upon entering it ordered all the people out of the church, and at the same time exhibited two pistols, and said that he had shot Burt.
It is urged that the court erred in permitting the introduction of the testimony as to what occurred at the church after the homicide. The defendant testified that he had shot the deceased in self-defense; that the deceased had not handed his pistol to him, but on the contrary had retained it, and had endeavored to draw it when he fired the shot at him. It was therefore perfectly competent to show that the defendant, at the time he entered the church immediately after he shot deceased, had two pistols, for this testimony tended to...
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