Crow v. State

• Decision Date: 28 April 1894
• Citation: 26 S.W. 209
• Parties: CROW v. STATE.
• Court: Texas Court of Criminal Appeals

26 S.W. 209

CROW v. STATE.

Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.

April 28, 1894.

Appeal from district court, Milam county; John N. Henderson, Judge.

Jim Bob Crow, convicted of murder in the first degree, appeals. Reversed.

T. S. Henderson, for appellant. R. L. Henry, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.

HURT, P. J.

The defendant in this case stands convicted for the murder of Miss Mollie White, the verdict being for murder of the first degree, with life sentence. To show a motive actuating this man to commit the crime, it was shown that he had waited upon her for a long time, and had courted her unsuccessfully; that he had rivals in one Em Cast and one Ellison Lockhart. A witness for the state testified that defendant told him that Miss Mollie had rejected him; that defendant, on this occasion, seemed very much affected; seemed to be crying; said he was going up there next day, get his letters and ring, and "she could go to hell." In a conversation afterwards he told this witness: "I will give you to understand that if I court a girl, and can't get her, nobody else shall have her, and especially Em Cast." This occurred more than a year before the killing. A note was found in the field of defendant's father, reflecting upon Miss Mollie. Another note was found at defendant's father's place, of a similar character, and delivered to the Whites. The authorship of these notes was attributed to Cast, and was the cause of the breaking of an engagement to marry between him and Miss Mollie. On the trial they were proved to be in the handwriting of defendant. Miss Mollie was killed on the 10th of July, it being Sunday night, at about 12 o'clock. She had attended church that night with Ellison. She and the rest of the family retired between 11 and 12 o'clock, and before 1 she was dead. Her throat was cut by a sharp instrument. Near the bed in which she slept was an open window, through which the assassin came and escaped. The father of deceased testified that outside of the window there were tracks leading off through the cotton patch. There was one track deeper than the rest, where it seemed the party had jumped out of the window.

W. H. Strickland, a constable, testified: "A short distance from the window there was a track deeper than the other tracks. * * * The tracks led off in a northwestwardly direction, about ten or twelve steps, to the cotton patch, and then diagonally across the cotton patch. * * * The party appeared to be running across the cotton patch. * * * I measured the best tracks that I could find for measurement in the cotton patch. It was difficult to get a good track to measure on account of the soft condition of the ground, but I found some tracks that were tolerably plain, and, where were the same. * * * First measured with a stick, and then with a rule. I only measured the tracks in the cotton patch." Defendant pointed out to witness the shoes he had worn on the day of the homicide. "I compared the measurements of the shoes with the measurements of the tracks. I had measured the length of the foot and the width and length of the heel. The track and the shoes measured exactly the same except the heel. There was a difference of a quarter of an inch either in the length or the width of the heel, and I can't say for certain which, but think it was in the length." Sheriff Bickett testified that he followed the tracks out across the cotton patch. "I measured the length of the tracks. Did not measure the heel nor the width of the tracks across the toe. I measured the tracks with a switch. On next day measured the shoes which defendant said he had worn on Sunday. I thought that the measurements fitted the shoes pretty well. The shoes were about a seven." Deputy Sheriff Gambill, at the instance of the sheriff, got the shoes of defendant to compare with the tracks in the cotton patch. He made the comparison on Tuesday. He testifies: "I thought they were exactly alike. The shoes were run in, and the left shoe was run in more than the right. I noticed the corresponding peculiarity about the tracks. I placed the shoes in the tracks and I thought they fitted exactly. I made tracks by the side of the original tracks with the shoe and they appeared to be the same. One tap had been removed from the heel of the left shoe, and the tacks projected about one-sixteenth of an inch. I noticed the imprint of the tacks in the tracks. The tacks that projected were on the left of the heel, and nearer the back than the front. On the left shoe the tacks were exactly the same way. I did not count the tacks. I noticed near the house, where the party had stepped on a rock with his left foot, and slid off, and the tacks had left scratches on the rock. * * * There are also some worn places about the size of a half-dollar on the inside of the sole, where the soles were worn out. I did not see anything corresponding to these places in the tracks, but they were filled up with mud and the bottom of the shoes appeared smooth. * * * The tracks were very plain and clear. I found many, and compared and examined many tracks, and every time the left was running in, had a missing tap, and the extending tacks corresponded exactly with the left shoe of defendant. * * * These are the shoes that made the tracks. Defendant wears about a number seven." Strickland, the constable, also testified that he followed the trail beyond the cotton patch, through a pasture of mesquite grass, by the dew being brushed away from the grass. No foot tracks here. Three or four hundred yards from this pasture there was no trail. At this distance there was a fresh track of an unshod horse. This led to a crossing on the Gabriel. The horse track led up to about three feet of the water. "I saw a man's track. The toe of the track was just in the edge of the water and was tolerably plain. It was the track of the left foot. To the right of it, and about a foot from it, there was an indentation about the size of the palm of my hand, and about an eighth or a quarter of an inch deep, that might have been made by the knee of a man. * * * On Tuesday I saw an unshod horse at defendant's house. I moved him off, and looked at his track and it was similar to the one I had traced that morning. I saw the pants that defendant said he had worn on the day before. There was some mud on the right knee of the pants. I think I called Mr. Bickett's attention to the mud on the knee." Neither the sheriff nor his deputy remembers having noticed any mud on the knee of the pants. On the other hand, appellant proved facts by a number of witnesses which, if they were in fact true, negative very powerfully his...