Johnson v. State

• Citation: 30 S.W. 31
• Parties: JOHNSON v. STATE.
• Decision Date: 09 March 1895
• Court: Supreme Court of Arkansas

Page 31

30 S.W. 31

JOHNSON v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

March 9, 1895.

Appeal from circuit court, Sebastian county; Edgar E. Bryant, Judge.

The appellant was indicted, at the October term, 1893, of the Sebastian circuit court, Ft. Smith district, for the crime of bigamy, and convicted, and sentenced for the term of three years in the penitentiary, and appeals to this court. Reversed.

Abstract: The evidence showed that, about the year 1887, defendant, a white person, and resident of the Indian Territory, intermarried with his first cousin, one Paralee Sivils, then a resident of the state of Arkansas, but on a visit to relatives in the Indian Territory. The evidence further showed that on the 28th October, 1892, a W. W. Johnson and Miss Maude Kimbrough were lawfully married in Sebastian county, Ark., by P. G. Scatterfield, one of the justices of the peace therein. There was evidence tending to show that the Maude Kimbrough, the party to this latter marriage, was the identical person named in the indictment, and that the W. W. Johnson, the other party to this marriage, was the defendant in this prosecution. There was evidence offered by the defendant, but, over his objections, excluded by the court, tending to show that, although the maiden name of the woman, party to the last marriage, was Maude Kimbrough, yet she had in the year 1889 intermarried with one Price, and that she went by that name until about the time of her marriage with defendant, as stated. The indictment reads as follows, to wit: "The grand jury of Sebastian county, in and for the Ft. Smith district thereof, in the name and by the authority of the state of Arkansas, accuses W. W. Johnson of the crime of bigamy, committed as follows, to wit: The said W. W. Johnson, on the 10th day of July, 1892, in the county and district aforesaid, feloniously did marry M. Kimbrough, he having at that time a living wife, from whom he had not been divorced." To this indictment defendant entered his demurrer, and the same was overruled, and exceptions reserved. Other facts will be stated in the opinion.

Edwin Hiner, for appellant. E. B. Kinsworthy, Atty. Gen., for the State.

BUNN, C. J.

The indictment is not very artistically drawn, but we will treat it as sufficient to put the defendant on notice of the charge upon which he was to be tried, and therefore hold it sufficient. The objection of the defendant to the record of the marriage of Maude Kimbrough to W. W. Johnson, and of the...