Hall v. State

• Decision Date: 09 June 1892
• Docket Number: 16,482
• Parties: Hall v. The State
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

31 N.E. 536

132 Ind. 317

Hall v. The State

No. 16,482

Supreme Court of Indiana

June 9, 1892

Petition for a Rehearing Overruled Oct. 5 1892.

From the La Grange Circuit Court.

Judgment reversed, with instructions to grant a new trial.

A Ellison and A. A. Chapin, for appellant.

A. G Smith, Attorney General, and J. T. Sullivan, for the State.

OPINION

Olds, J.

The appellant, Martin Hall, was indicted for the murder of one Sheridan E. Hughes, by administering poison to him.

There was a trial resulting in a verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree, and fixing the appellant's punishment at imprisonment in the State prison during life. Numerous errors are assigned. The contention on the part of the State was that the appellant invited the deceased to take a drink of liquor from a bottle which he had, and the deceased did drink from the bottle, and that there was strychnine in the liquor.

The deceased lived upon a large farm in La Grange county, his family consisting of his wife and child and mother-in-law, Mrs. Wallace, and himself. The farm, of four hundred acres, well improved, was owned by Mrs. Hughes and her mother, Mrs. Wallace. The deceased was about twenty-four years of age, in good health, and managed the farm, farming quite extensively and dealing in horses,--buying, selling and trading them. The defendant was a man about twenty-eight years old, and during the summer, prior to the death of Hughes, on the 16th day of September, 1891, he had been working for the Hughes, and had rented a field for wheat of him, and had been cutting corn for him, and he kept a horse and buggy there. On the morning of the 16th day of September, 1891, Mr. Hughes had two or three other young men working for him. There were also a Mr. Dill and his hired man, who were travelling across the county with a number of horses, and were camping near the house, at Mr. Hughes', on this morning. After breakfast Mr. Hughes had his team hitched to the buggy preparatory to going to town, and before going was transacting some business or completing a horse trade with Mr. Dill, and the other young men were getting ready to go to work. They were all about in the vicinity of the barn. The appellant was there also cleaning out his buggy and hitching up his horse preparatory to going away. After hitching his horse to his buggy, the appellant took a quart bottle, with what is said to be cherry wine and whisky, to the house. Mrs. Hughes tasted it and Mrs. Wallace drank of it and he left the bottle at the house. He then went back to the barn where his horse and buggy were and held up a small flask and invited Mr. Hughes to drink with him. Hughes came to the buggy, and in the presence of two of the hired men Hughes suggested to appellant that he drink first, and appellant took the bottle and placed it to his lips as if taking a drink. As to whether he did in fact drink is controverted. He then handed the bottle to Hughes, and he drank all there was in the flask except a teaspoonful or thereabouts and returned the bottle to the appellant, and he broke it on a stone at the edge of the barn. Hughes then stepped away from the buggy by the side of the barn, and appellant got into his buggy and drove out into the road a short distance from the barn. The evidence is conflicting as to the distance, witnesses placing it from fifteen rods to probably twice that distance. When he got into the buggy he spoke to one of the other hired men and asked him if he was going to the corn-field to cut corn, and on his replying that he was, he invited him to ride, and he stopped in the road waiting for him, and remained there some minutes.

Soon after Hughes took the drink he began complaining of its being bitter, and commenced spitting and soon after complained of being sick. Just the length of time after he took the drink that he began to complain is in dispute, but witnesses testify that it was while appellant remained waiting in the highway, and that he addressed appellant in a loud voice, accusing him of having quinine in the liquor. The appellant disclaims having heard him say anything about it or make any complaint. The appellant soon drove on and went to his father's, near to Kendallville, some twelve miles or more distant, where he was followed in the afternoon and advised of the death of Hughes. There is evidence tending to show that appellant heard what Hughes said while appellant was waiting in the road. Other witnesses an equal distance away testify to hearing what Hughes said. Hughes died from one to two hours after taking the drink. The declarations of Hughes from the time he drank from the bottle up to his death were admitted in evidence over the objection of the appellant. There were three classes of declarations of Hughes admitted in evidence.

First. Those made while the evidence tended to show that the appellant was within hearing distance.

Second. Those made after the appellant had departed and not made in view of approaching death, so as to be admissible as dying declarations.

Third. Dying declaration made after the deceased believed he would die in a very short space of time.

As to the first class of declarations, they were clearly competent. There was evidence tending to show that the appellant was within hearing distance and heard what Hughes said, and it was for the jury to determine whether or not he did in fact hear them.

The second class of declarations were of this character: Mrs. Hughes was testifying as a witness, and in answer to questions she testified that her husband, the deceased, on coming to the house, said that the appellant called him around the corner of the barn and asked him if he did not want a drink of blackberry wine. He said there was quinine in it, that it was very bitter, that it was an overdose of quinine; it was grainy; said he felt the grains as they went down his throat.

Under the well-established rule in this State these declarations were inadmissible. They were surely narrative of a past transaction made to the wife when Hughes came to the house in the absence of the appellant and some time after the occurrence. The exact length of time is disputed, possibly only ten or fifteen minutes after taking the drink. The exact time we do not deem material, but the declarations were separated from the act so that they became a mere narrative. If admissible at the time they were made, they would have been admissible at a much longer time afterwards if the deceased had lived.

In Binns v. State, 57 Ind. 46, it is held that declarations which are simply the narrative of a past event, depending solely for its effect upon the credit of the party making it, and not so connected with the main facts as to illustrate its character, are not competent evidence. The declarations in that case, held to be inadmissible, are not materially different from those admitted in this case, and made quite as soon after happening of the event. In that case the deceased was shot, and she said "she was stooping down putting wood in the stove at the time of the occurrence, and the shot came from outside through the window, and she was stooping down fronting the window immediately fronting the stove at the time of the occurrence." This decision has been followed and approved by the subsequent decisions of this court. Montgomery v. State, 80 Ind. 338.

In Jones v. State, 71 Ind. 66, a witness testified that after the deceased was shot he first directed that a doctor be sent for, and that in five or six minutes after that he said Prince Jones shot him. This declaration was held to be inadmissible as a part of the res gestoe. The court in that case says: "It may not be necessary that the declaration should be strictly contemporaneous with the main fact in order to be admissible, * * * but all the authorities agree, so far as we are advised, that a declaration which amounts to no more than a mere narrative of a past occurrence is not admissible."

In the case of Doles v. State, 97 Ind. 555, the same rule is announced, and statements of the deceased to the effect that he had been...