Dedge v. State
| Decision Date | 10 November 1914 |
| Parties | DEDGE v. STATE. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
Error to Circuit Court, Duval County; Geo. Cooper Gibbs, Judge.
John L Dedge was convicted of murder in the second degree, and brings error. Affirmed.
Syllabus by the Court
Previous jury service within the year is now a disqualification, and not a privilege personal to the venireman.
Trifling changes in physical conditions do not render photographs inadmissible.
An accused, upon voluntarily becoming a witness, may be impeached by proper proof of contradictory statements previously made, not amounting to a confession of guilt illegally obtained.
If error be predicated upon the bill of exceptions, it must appear affirmatively, and not by a forced inference.
The evidence warranting a verdict for murder in the first degree a conviction of murder in the second degree will not be disturbed.
COUNSEL A. G. Hartridge, of Jacksonville, for plaintiff in error.
T. F. West, Atty. Gen., and C. O. Andrews, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.
Under an indictment for murder in the first degree, John L. Dedge was convicted of murder in the second degree and sentenced to life imprisonment.
The court properly excused sua sponte three veniremen who stated they had conscientious scruples against the infliction of the death penalty. The indictment submitted an issue to them involving that penalty, and the state was entitled to a jury that left to the Legislature the determination of that question of state policy. The judge, in so rejecting a talesman, does not express his opinion of the weight of the evidence that may thereafter be submitted to the jury for its determination.
Previous Jury service within the year is now a disqualification, and not a personal privilege, as the statute was when the case of Yates v. State, 43 Fla. 177, 29 So. 965, was decided.
There was no error in admitting in evidence photographs of the scene of the homicide. The physical changes that took place between the time of the killing and the time of the trial were trifling, and were accounted for, and, as the jury visited the premises, the admission of the photographs became as evidence well nigh negligible.
That Dedge actually killed William H. Warren was abundantly proved, and Dedge upon the stand admitted that fact. In his testimony as a voluntary witness he stated that he fired the first shot from the bathroom window, near which shots from Warren's gun were found, and that his second and third shots were fired from the porch. For the purpose of adducing impeaching testimony, and after being warned that he need answer nothing that would tend to incriminate him, he was asked if he had not stated to a deputy sheriff who arrested him very soon after the killing that he fired all three shots from the porch. Upon his denial that he had so stated, the deputy was permitted to contradict him. It is contended that this was error; that through the guise of impeaching testimony the state was able to get before the jury a confession that was incompetent because obtained under duress.
We can readily see much force in the contention, if we admit that the statement could, in law, be considered a confession of guilt; but it bears none of the earmarks of such confession. If, for example, the accused upon his arrest should say that he was in Pensacola when a homicide was...
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Diehl v. State
...30 Fla. 287, 11 So. 547; Lambright v. State, 34 Fla. 564, 16 So. 582; Yates v. State, 43 Fla. 177, 29 So. 965. In the case of Dedge v. State, 68 Fla. 240, 67 So. 43, decided in 1914, it was held that previous jury within the year was a disqualification and not a personal privilege as the st......
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Morris v. State
... ... had voluntarily made himself a witness in the case ... 'An ... accused, upon voluntarily becoming a witness, may be ... impeached by proper proof of contradictory statements ... previously made, not amounting to a confession of guilt, ... illegally obtained.' Dedge v. State, 68 Fla ... 240, 67 So. 43; Herndon v. State, 72 Fla. 108, 72 ... So. 833, and cases there cited ... The ... next assignment presented for review is based upon certain ... remarks of the state attorney in suggesting that the court ... call as a witness William McKenney, ... ...
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...McCoy v. State, 40 Fla. 494, 24 So. 485; Mobley v. State, 41 Fla. 621, 26 So. 732; Morrison v. State, 42 Fla. 149, 28 So. 97; Dedge v. State, 68 Fla. 240, 67 So. 43; v. State, 81 Fla. 553, 88 So. 471; Ammons v. State, 88 Fla. 444, 102 So. 642; Roberts v. State, 94 Fla. 149, 113 So. 726; Wil......
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