Magness v. State

• Decision Date: 17 November 1913
• Docket Number: 16,969
• Citation: 63 So. 352,106 Miss. 195
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: A. P. MAGNESS v. STATE

63 So. 352

106 Miss. 195

A. P. MAGNESS v. STATE

No. 16,969

Supreme Court of Mississippi

November 17, 1913

APPEAL from the circuit court of Attala county, HON. J. A. TEAT Judge.

A. P Magness was convicted of homicide and appeals.

The facts are fully stated in the opinion of the court.

Affirmed.

Hill &amp McBee, Luckett & Guyton and J. T. Dunn, attorneys for appellant.

Geo. H. Ethridge, assistant attorney-general, for the state.

OPINION

SMITH, C. J.

We find no reversible error in this record, and deem it necessary to notice specifically only one of the matters assigned for error.

One Reagan, an eyewitness to the homicide, testified in behalf of appellant to facts showing that appellant acted in self-defense in killing Gillon. On cross-examination he was asked if he did not appear before the grand jury which indicted appellant, and make a statement substantially in accordance with that of the state's witnesses. It then developed that he had appeared before the grand jury twice, testifying the first time to facts exonerating, and the second time to facts incriminating appellant. He explained these contradictory statements by saying that he was intimidated into making the second. Among the numerous questions then asked him were, if he did not make the first statement before the grand jury because Magness had told him to do so, and if he had not told the grand jury on his second appearance before it that he made the first statement because Magness told him to do so. The first question he answered in the negative, and to the second he answered that he did not remember.

The state, in rebuttal, over the objection of appellant, was permitted to introduce evidence that when before the grand jury the second time Reagan did make the statement inquired about.

The ground of appellant's objection is that Reagan's statement, conceding that he in fact made it that he testified as he did when first before the grand jury for the reason that Magness told him to do so has no relevancy to Magness' guilt or innocence of the crime charged, was therefore collateral to the issue being tried, and consequently the state was bound by Reagan's testimony relative thereto.

The capacity of a witness to give correct testimony, his mental attitude or feeling, his bias, hostility, or interest relative to the matter in issue are matters proper for the jury to take into consideration in determining how far the witness may be believed, and are not collateral to the issue within the rule invoked by appellant.

The statement attributed to Reagan, if made, tended to impair his credibility and weaken the effect of his testimony. If he was testifying as he did simply because he was requested to do so, his testimony ought, of course, to have been disregarded by the jury, and certainly his own admission was competent evidence to establish that fact. That the admission related to his testimony before the grand jury, and not to that given on the trial then in progress, is immaterial, for it bore the...