Harrison v. State

• Decision Date: 27 November 1912
• Citation: 153 S.W. 139
• Parties: HARRISON v. STATE.
• Court: Texas Court of Criminal Appeals

153 S.W. 139

HARRISON v. STATE.

Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.

November 27, 1912.

On Motion for Rehearing February 5, 1913.

Appeal from District Court, Comanche County; J. H. Arnold, Judge.

J. H. Harrison was convicted of being an accessory to seduction, and he appeals. Affirmed.

Smith & Palmer, of Comanche, for appellant. C. E. Lane, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.

PRENDERGAST, J.

The appellant was indicted as an accessory to the crime of seduction. The indictment properly charged that Sam Wimberly on October 15, 1910, seduced Mattie Waldrip. Then the indictment properly charged appellant as an accessory in that, knowing that said Wimberly had committed said offense of seduction, with the purpose and in order that said Wimberly might evade a trial for said offense so committed by him, did unlawfully and willfully conceal and give aid to him. The jury convicted him and fixed his penalty at the lowest—two years in the penitentiary.

The indictment follows, as literally as it can, the form prescribed by Judge White in his Annotated P. C. § 108, and is sufficient, expressly so held by repeated decisions of this court. Gann v. State, 42 Tex. Cr. R. 133, 57 S. W. 837. It is unnecessary to detail the evidence. The appellant neither testified nor offered any evidence. The testimony was amply sufficient to justify the jury to believe and find that said Wimberly was guilty of the crime of seducing said Mattie Waldrip, as charged in the indictment, which question was properly submitted by the court to the jury requiring such finding by them before they could convict appellant.

The testimony was amply sufficient to justify the jury to believe and find that, after said Wimberly had committed said crime of seduction by illicit intercourse with Mattie Waldrip, he got her in the family way, and that a short time before the grand jury convened, at which this investigation was made and indictment found, he procured an abortion to be had upon her; that, about a month after the abortion, the grand jury convened and began investigating all this matter, and, among others, had had as a witness Mattie Waldrip's brother Tom before it, with whom she then lived, and for several months prior thereto had lived, together with another sister; that she had also just been summoned by the grand jury to appear before it as a witness in the same matter. Her father, T. G. Waldrip, was also a material witness in the matter, and if he had not already been, doubtless would have been, summoned before the grand jury as a witness in said investigation, as the evidence justified the jury to believe appellant knew and anticipated. Mattie Waldrip and her sister, Myrtle Waldrip, and brother, Tom, lived some 10 or 12 miles distant from where her father, T. G. Waldrip, lived. They all lived some considerable distance from the town of Comanche, county seat of Comanche county, where the grand jury was in session. Tom was before the grand jury on Wednesday, as a witness in said investigation. On Thursday his father went by for him, and they together went to the little town of Gustine to purchase some supplies. It seems that this town was the trading point of said Waldrips, and somewhere not far from the location of appellant, said Wimberly, and others connected with this matter; that along about the middle of the evening, after said Waldrip had made his purchases and was at or in his buggy waiting for his son Tom to leave Gustine and return to their homes, he was approached by appellant, who introduced himself to said Waldrip. Appellant proceeded to engage Waldrip for a while in general conversation, then brought up to him the trouble he and his said daughter Mattie were having; and, after thus bringing up the subject, he invited and had Waldrip to get in a hack with him where they could sit down and discuss the matter. He then proceeded to tell him that he (appellant) knew of other girls who had gotten into the same kind of trouble and had left the community where it occurred, gone a considerable distance, redeemed themselves, restored their reputation, and married well and were doing well. He then proceeded to ask said Waldrip how much it would take to move him and his daughters out of the community, telling him that his (Waldrip's) and his daughters' friends had made up some money for him if he wanted to use it, and asked him how much it would take to move him. Said Waldrip replied that, if it was a free donation made by his friends, he would take whatever was made up for him, if it was sufficient for him to leave on. Appellant then told him to stay where he was till another fellow came to see him (Waldrip) and he asked him if he knew Sol Ingram. Waldrip replied that he had met him a few times, but did not know that he was personally acquainted with him. Directly Ingram came to him (Waldrip) where he then was, and Waldrip thinks appellant came with Ingram to him; but, whether he did or not, just a little later he did so. Then they all three (appellant, Ingram, and Waldrip) talked the matter over, and Ingram told him, in the presence of appellant, that appellant had told him about the $200 and how it had been made up by his (Waldrip's) and his daughters' friends. They did not tell him who had made it up, or who were their friends, but asked him, if he was paid this money, if he "could go and go right now." Waldrip replied that it would take him a little while to wind up his business. Ingram kept on talking, and finally asked him if he "could not go right now if they would give me (him) that much, and I told him I reckoned so, and Mr. Harrison (appellant) was there then, I know." Ingram then asked appellant if he (appellant) could go and drive one of the conveyances to take said Waldrip and his daughters away. After some parleying, appellant agreed to do so. There was then some discussion between the three as to where he was to go to take the train. Waldrip told them that Comanche would be the nearest point, and they gave him to understand they did not want him to go to Comanche to take the train. They then agreed that Mullen, another railroad station in another county, was the next nearest place. The understanding between the three was that appellant was to leave Comanche county that night, taking his children with him. This conference and agreement occurred about three hours before sundown. Ingram and appellant then told Waldrip to go by, get his children, take them over to his camp, and that they would come on that night to his camp and take him and his children from his camp to Mullen. All this agreement was carried out by these persons that night. Waldrip, with his son Tom, did at once go to Tom's place, hastily have his two daughters to pack what clothes and household goods they were to take, leaving for his camp about 8 o'clock at night; his daughter Myrtle in the buggy with him, and his daughter Mattie in the buggy with her brother Tom, going then some 10 or 12 miles at night to his camp; that he then, after reaching his camp with his children, hastily prepared what clothing and household goods he could take in trunks and about midnight, or a little later, Ingram and appellant appeared at his camp, one with a buggy and the other with a hack. One of the teams was that of Wimberly. Said Ingram and Waldrip, after placing the trunks of Waldrip and his daughters in their conveyances, proceeded, after midnight, with them to the said town of Mullen, traveling all that night, reaching Mullen the next day. Appellant drove one of the conveyances part of the time that night with said Waldrip and his wife therein, and Ingram the other with the two daughters of Waldrip, Mattie and Myrtle. During the night, these persons exchanged, appellant driving the buggy with the two daughters in it part of the way, and Ingram the conveyance with Waldrip and his wife therein part of the way. Upon reaching Mullen, they took the trunks of the parties to the depot of the railroad, and the womenfolk to the hotel. They went to the wagon yard. After reaching Mullen, and before Ingram and appellant left Mullen returning to their homes, they paid Waldrip $165 of the $200 cash they were to pay him, gave each of Waldrip's two daughters some of the money, took out $10 to pay Harrison for his time and efforts in going and driving one of the conveyances, and agreed to pay Waldrip's son for him later the balance of the $200 cash. It was further shown that, after the conference and agreement between said Waldrip, appellant, and Ingram, it was after banking hours, and the banks in the town had closed; that Ingram went to one of the bankers and to some of the merchants in an attempt to raise the $200 cash, telling them that he was compelled to have $200 cash that evening. By manipulating around with two or three of them, he arranged between them to raise, and did raise and get, $200 cash that evening. The evidence further shows that appellant and Ingram, after getting said two conveyances, went at night to said Waldrip's camp, arriving there, as stated above, about or after midnight; that said Wimberly was with them when they started to this camp for Waldrip and his daughters and that said Wimberly drove the hack from Gustine to Fleming a part of the way, and appellant and said Ingram rode in the buggy that far together. It further shows that, as agreed between them, Waldrip did not tell them when they separated the next day in Mullen where he was going to take his family. They did not know, and wanted not to know. That was a part of the plan arranged between them.

Appellant has several bills of exceptions to the admission of certain testimony. Not one of these bills is prepared in accordance with the well-established and uniformly enforced rules of this court. None of them set out the proceedings in the court below sufficiently to enable this court to know whether or not an error has been committed. Neither of them of and within themselves disclose all that is necessary...