French v. State, 4 Div. 798.
Decision Date | 19 January 1932 |
Docket Number | 4 Div. 798. |
Citation | 141 So. 713,25 Ala.App. 53 |
Parties | FRENCH v. STATE. |
Court | Alabama Court of Appeals |
Rehearing Denied March 22, 1932.
Appeal from Circuit Court, Dale County; J. S. Williams, Judge.
William E. French was convicted of manslaughter in the first degree and he appeals.
Affirmed.
Certiorari denied by Supreme Court in French v. State, 141 So 717.
Sollie & Sollie, of Ozark, for appellant.
Thos. E. Knight, Jr., Atty. Gen., and Thos. Seay Lawson, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.
The defendant, while under the influence of whisky, killed his own son, by shooting him with a gun. The indictment was for murder in the first degree and the defenses were not guilty self-defense, and insanity. There was also evidence tending to prove a drunken condition of defendant at the time of the homicide, which rendered the defendant incapable of a formed design to take life. The jury evidently accepted the latter theory and returned a verdict of guilty of manslaughter in the first degree and fixed his punishment at ten years in the penitentiary.
On the trial the state examined one Bartow Mattox who testified to the following state of facts:
Upon defendant being examined as a witness in his own behalf, he offered to prove: The court refused to allow this testimony, and the defendant excepted. The facts sought to be proved were not a part of the res gestæ; were details of prior transactions and not related to statements testified to by the witness Mattox. As to (5) the defendant will not be allowed to testify to his intention or to make evidence for himself.
Upon this point the court instructed the jury as follows:
These excerpts clearly state the law regarding this question. Hurst v. State, 21 Ala. App. 313, 108 So. 77; Bluett v. State, 151 Ala. 41, 44 So. 84; Eden v. State (Ala. App.) 129 So. 797.
Appellant cites numerous authorities holding that, where one party to a suit has brought out a part of a conversation, the adverse party is entitled to bring out the whole conversation, if he so desires, but this rule does not apply to particulars of former transactions not constituting a part of the res gestæ, or tending to shed light on the issues. The above rule is fully stated in Gary v. State, 18 Ala. App. 367, 92 So. 533. There was no exclusion by the court of what deceased said at the time of the difficulty. That evidence was admitted without objection.
There was no error in refusing to give, at defendant's request, written charge, which for convenience we have marked (1). This charge fails to hypothesize an act of violence, on the part of defendant, from which ordinarily, in the usual course of events, death or great bodily harm might result. Reynolds v. State, 154 Ala. 14, 45 So. 894.
Refused charges 2, 3, 15, and 21 were covered by the court in its general charge. Moreover, charge 21 is argumentative, involved, and misleading.
The refused charges requested by defendant referring to the plea of insanity were all fully covered by the court in its able and lucid charges on this question. In this charge the jury was fully instructed as to every right to which the defendant was entitled under such a plea.
The normal sexual relations between defendant and his wife growing out of the fact that he was thirty-one years her senior are...
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Gosa v. State
...v. State, 140 Ala. 87, 37 So. 81. Charge 26 is bad and was correctly refused. Reynolds v. State, 154 Ala. 14, 45 So. 894; French v. State, 25 Ala.App. 53, 141 So. 713. Refused Charges 30, 31, and 32 recite as '30. I Charge you, gentlemen of the jury, that if you believe from all of the evid......
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Bryson v. State
...penitentiary is not part of the same transaction as the defendant's sister's cutting and dying the defendant's hair. French v. State, 25 Ala.App. 53, 141 So. 713, cert. denied, 225 Ala. 8, 141 So. 717 (1932), held that the same transaction rule "does not apply to particulars of former trans......
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