Golden v. State

• Decision Date: 16 October 1886
• Citation: 2 S.W. 531
• Parties: GOLDEN <I>v.</I> STATE.<SMALL><SUP>1</SUP></SMALL>
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

2 S.W. 531

GOLDENv.

STATE.¹

Court of Appeals of Texas.

October 16, 1886.

Appeal from district court, Lamar county.

The first count of the indictment charged the appellant with the theft of $175, United States paper currency belonging to Mrs. E. J. Weedon, on November 23, 1885. The second count charged him with embezzlement of the same money. He was convicted under the second count, and his punishment was assessed at nine years in the penitentiary, — well merited in view of the detestable depravity disclosed by the evidence of the nefarious means by which the appellant, who claimed to be a minister of the Gospel, defrauded helpless and friendless women out of all their hard-earned money.

In December, 1885, an investigation of this case was had before a justice of the peace, sitting as an examining court, and the principal witnesses were examined, and their testimony reduced to writing. On the trial in the district court this written testimony was the first evidence offered by the state. The predicate laid was the absence and residence of the witnesses in the state of North Carolina. One objection interposed by the defense was that the witnesses were absent by the aid and procurement of the attorney for the state. In support of the predicate and reply to the objection, J. W. Ownby stated under oath that he was county attorney of Lamar county in December, 1885, when the examining trial of the appellant was held, and he had ever since been, and still was, the county attorney. It was true that he assisted the witnesses (E. J. Nancy and Harriet Weedon) to leave the state. He made up money to pay their way back to North Carolina. He wrote and had published an article calling on the citizens to assist the said witnesses in getting money to pay their fare back to North Carolina. He did not try to get them to remain and testify in this case, nor had he tried to get them to return and attend the trial of this case. He could not get them back by any process of law, and he knew it was useless to ask them to come back. They were gray-headed, unmarried women, who had been defrauded by the appellant out of everything they had. They were in destitute circumstances, left in midwinter with nothing to eat, nothing to do, and no place to sleep. The neighbors carried them food. They were gray-headed women, one of whom was a cripple, and unable to get out of her seat. They wanted to go back to their home in North Carolina, where they could get work. For the reasons above set out, and as an act of simple humanity, and not for the purpose of sending the witnesses beyond the process or jurisdiction of the court, he, the county attorney, did assist them to go back to their home. In certifying the bill of exceptions, the trial judge states that the testimony offered was clearly identified, and was shown to have been taken in conformity with law, having been read over to and signed by the witnesses, and that the accused was present and cross-examined them.

All objections being overruled, the first evidence offered by the state was the testimony given before the examining court by Mrs. E. J. Weedon, the person alleged as the owner of the money. It recited, in substance, that the defendant, claiming to be a preacher, music teacher, and school-master, married the witness' daughter in Alamance county, North Carolina, in October, 1885, and left for Florida, where he said he owned an orange grove, on the next day, taking his wife, and $300 given his wife on her marriage by witness and her two sisters. Witness next heard from him in Paris, Texas, from whence he dispatched her to send him $300. Witness did not send the money, and received several letters from him begging for money Witness and her sisters, Nancy, Harriet, and Molly Weedon, arrived at Paris on October 22, 1885. Defendant and his wife met them at the depot. On the next morning, the defendant, pretending that it was dangerous for the witness to keep money about her person, after repeated importunities, prevailed on witness to give him what money she had, $175, to deposit in the bank for her, promising to bring her a receipt or deposit check for the same, which he never did. He left a few days afterwards, and witness saw no more of him until after his arrest. She had never since seen any of the money.

The next evidence put in by the state was the written testimony of Miss Nancy T. Weedon, a sister of Mrs. Weedon, taken at the examining trial of the appellant. It corroborated clearly the most material of the statements already detailed in the testimony of Mrs. Weedon, and divulged the further facts that, by similar means and the same pretexts, the appellant also obtained from this witness $169, and from her crippled sister $150.

By consent of the defense the state introduced the written testimony of H. A. Bland, cashier of the Farmers' and Merchants' Bank of Paris, Texas, given at the examining trial of the appellant. The witness stated that on November 23, 1885, the appellant came into said bank, and said he wanted to make a deposit, and witness received from him $130 in paper currency. He deposited it in the name of W. A. M. Golden. The next day he made another deposit of $120, currency, in his own name of W. A. M. Golden. On the next succeeding day the bank paid his check for $50, and on the second day thereafter he checked out his balance of $200. He had had no previous deposits with the bank.

W. J. Warren, for the state, disclaiming any purpose of criminating himself, testified that he saw defendant several weeks before he was arrested, and knew that he had some money, and knew that he was going to get some more, as he so told witness. Witness saw him a few days before his arrest, and he then had some money. The night before the defendant left home, witness saw him at the White Elephant saloon, and he then had money, and also some deposit checks on the Farmers' & Merchants' Bank. Defendant was betting at faro. Witness left about 10 o'clock that night, and up to that hour the defendant had lost about $175, and was betting his deposit checks, and still losing. The game seemed to be going against him. He had been gambling for several days, and witness, who was interested in the gaming-bank, took some of the defendant's checks as collateral. But, on witness' arrival at the said bank, the next morning, he learned that the Rev. Mr. Golden (the defendant) had anticipated him, and drawn out of the bank all the money he had there. Witness did say, on the day Golden left, that he intended to catch him, and get his (witness') money, and he would have taken the money from Golden if he could have found him. Witness did not hire two horses to follow Golden, nor go out of Paris that day, though friends of the witness may have hired two horses that day on his credit, which was good at the livery stable. The state rested on the foregoing evidence.

Mrs. Ella Golden, defendant's wife, testified, in his behalf, that the money turned over to her husband by her mother and aunts was her (witness') money, sent to her by her uncle who lived in Missouri, who sent it to her mother to educate her, the witness, though she never sent witness to school. Witness could neither read nor write. "They" (her mother and aunts) gave witness and her husband $300 of the money when she was married, and said they would bring the remainder when they came out to Texas. When they came to Paris, they voluntarily turned all the money over to the defendant, and told him to take it, and use it just as he wanted to.

On her cross-examination this witness stated that she remembered testifying in the examining court. "They" (evidently alluding to the Weedon ladies) told her what she had to say, and threatened to choke her if she did not. Her mother and aunt sat on either side of her, and would punch her, and tell her what to say. They would not let her talk to defendant until after she had testified, nor let her see any one at home previous to the trial. She did, at the examining trial, testify that the defendant locked her up in a room at Memphis all day; but her mother told her she had to swear that. Witness did not, at the examining trial, state that the money belonged to her. Her uncle sent her that money at five or six different times. Sometimes he sent her one hundred dollars, and sometimes fifteen or twenty. She never saw her uncle. She did not remember testifying in the examining court that she did not know whether or not the money was turned over to the defendant voluntarily, nor that she testified that she did not know why it was turned over to him, but supposed it was to make a living with. She remembered that Mr. Perry and County Attorney Ownby came the night before the examining trial, and asked her about the case, and that she told them that the defendant locked her up in the hotels at every place they stopped at on their way to Texas, and that she would be confined all day by herself; but "they" told her to tell that. She did not remember telling Perry and Ownby that her husband told her he was going to telegraph to her mother for $300, and that if she did not send it he would write for them to come out to Paris, as that was the only way he could get their money, and that when they came he was going to get their money, and then take witness and go west, leaving them. "I did [not?] tell them that." Before witness' mother and aunts came to Paris, the defendant showed her a picture of a lady and child, and said that was his other wife, and asked witness if she was mad about it, and said that he would give her a good whipping if she told her mother and aunts what he was going to do. She did not remember telling Perry and Ownby that she was afraid of defendant because he had treated her so badly, and that she believed she could (not?) testify if he was where he could look or speak to her. She was not under any kind of duress when she testified at the examining court, but believes she did ask Mr. Ownby to...