Keller v. State

• Decision Date: 22 October 1927
• Citation: 299 S.W. 803,155 Tenn. 633
• Parties: KELLER v. STATE.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

299 S.W. 803

155 Tenn. 633

KELLER v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Tennessee.

October 22, 1927

Appeal in Error from Circuit Court, Blount County; John J. Blair Judge.

James Keller was convicted of involuntary manslaughter, and he appeals in error. Affirmed.

The Attorney General, for the State.

GREEN C.J.

The plaintiff in error was charged with driving an automobile while under the influence of an intoxicant and running said car over James A. Goddard, thereby causing the death of the latter, upon the streets of Maryville. There was a verdict of involuntary manslaughter, with a sentence of 18 months in the penitentiary, and the plaintiff in error has appealed in error to this court.

The only assignments made in behalf of plaintiff in error challenge the sufficiency of the evidence.

It is strongly urged that the preponderance of the evidence is against the finding of the jury that plaintiff in error was under the influence of an intoxicant at the time of the tragedy. We have carefully reviewed the evidence and discussed it orally, and are of opinion that the weight of the proof sustains the verdict of the jury. Many persons saw the plaintiff in error about the time Goddard was killed before and after, and the greater number of witnesses testified that plaintiff in error was intoxicated. While some of the testimony offered on behalf of the state is sharply criticised, we think the jury were warranted in accepting it as true. It appears without dispute that plaintiff in error was arrested and taken to jail after Goddard died, a few minutes after the collision. An hour or two later several witnesses called at the jail to see plaintiff in error and found him asleep, and had difficulty in waking him. He knew that Goddard had died. Plaintiff in error appears to be quite a decent young man, and we doubt that he could have fallen into a sound sleep so shortly after this fatality, which he occasioned, had he not been under the influence of an intoxicant.

A question of more difficulty is raised by the contention that if the intoxicated condition of plaintiff in error be conceded, nevertheless, it was not the cause or occasion of Goddard's death. Some proof was introduced on behalf of the plaintiff in error, including his own testimony, tending to show that he was driving his car carefully at the time Goddard was struck; that Goddard was undertaking to cross a street in the middle of a block; that his appearance on the street was unexpected; and that the collision could not have been avoided in the exercise of due care.

Chapter 117 of the Acts of 1925 prohibits under prescribed penalties "any person who is under the influence of an intoxicant" from "driving an automobile or other motor driven vehicle on the public highways of the state of Tennessee." This court has said that the act relates to the use of intoxicants as a beverage by persons "in such manner as to deprive them of their sense of discretion, and render them, in combination with an automobile on the highway, extremely dangerous agencies to the life and limb of others." Bostwick v. State, 154 Tenn. 1, 285 S.W. 49.

In Holder v. State, 152 Tenn. 390, 277 S.W. 900, this court held, construing section 6444 Thompson's-Shannon's Code, defining involuntary manslaughter as "the unlawful killing of another without malice * * * in the commission of some unlawful act," that the killing must be the natural or probable result of the unlawful act. The same conclusion was announced in Copeland v. State, 154 Tenn....