Newell v. State

• Citation: 115 Ala. 54,22 So. 572
• Parties: NEWELL v. STATE.
• Decision Date: 28 June 1897
• Court: Supreme Court of Alabama

22 So. 572

115 Ala. 54

NEWELL v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Alabama

June 28, 1897

Appeal from city court of Selma; J. W. Mabry, Judge.

Pig Newell was indicted and tried for murder, was convicted of murder in the first degree, and sentenced to be hung, and appeals. Affirmed.

The indictment was as follows: "The grand jury of said county charge that, before the finding of this indictment Pig Newell, alias Mills Newell, alias Mills Johnson, did unlawfully, and with malice aforethought, kill Wright Crawford by shooting him with a gun. The grand jury of said county further charge that, before the finding of this indictment, Pig Newell, alias Mills Newell, alias Mills Johnson, did unlawfully, and with malice aforethought, kill Wright Crawford by cutting him with a knife. The grand jury of said county further charge that, before the finding of this indictment, Pig Newell, alias Mills Newell, alias Mills Johnson, did unlawfully, and with malice aforethought, kill Wright Crawford by burning him up with fire. The grand jury of said county further charge that, before the finding of this indictment, Pig Newell, alias Mills Newell, alias Mills Johnson, did unlawfully, and with malice aforethought, kill Wright Crawford by some means to this grand jury unknown. Against the peace and dignity of the state of Alabama." The defendant demurred to the fourth count of the indictment upon the ground that it does not sufficiently describe the means by which the deceased was killed. This demurrer was overruled, and the defendant duly excepted. The motion to quash the indictment and the plea in abatement filed by the defendant are set forth at length in the opinion. The evidence for the state tended to show that the last time that Wright Crawford, the deceased, was seen, he went off with the defendant; that several days after they left there were found, some distance from where the deceased lived, the bones of a human body in a pile of ashes; and that there were found near this fire some buttons and pieces of underclothing. The mother of the deceased testified that she had these buttons and was then asked, "Were they the same buttons deceased had on his clothes when he left?" Defendant objected to this question because it called for the opinion of the witness, and that the witness should describe the buttons the deceased had worn and the buttons found, and leave it to the jury to decide if they were the same. The court overruled the objection, and the defendant duly excepted. The witness testified that they were the same buttons. Upon this witness further stating that she found a piece of heavy white undershirt, she was asked by the state, "Had you ever seen that piece before?" The defendant objected to this question upon the same grounds as were interposed to the other question asked the witness, and duly excepted to the court's overruling his objection. The witness answered "Yes, sir; same shirt my son wore, or same sort of shirt." The witness also testified against the objection and exception of the defendant that other pieces of underclothing found at the place where the fire was were the clothing worn by her son when he went off from home. Another witness for the state testified that the night before the killing the deceased and the defendant spent the night at his house, and that while the defendant and he (the witness) were talking the defendant said to him, among other things, that he was going to shoot the deceased. This testimony was objected to by the defendant. The objection was overruled and the defendant duly excepted. Another witness for the state testified that on the day the deceased disappeared the defendant came to her house, which was about one-half mile from where the burning above referred to was, and asked her for some matches, saying that he wanted to smoke, and that the defendant had blood all over him. There was other evidence for the state that a short time after the killing the defendant left the neighborhood. John Golson, a witness for the state, testified that he had the warrant of arrest for the defendant, charging him with killing the deceased and that, in company with one Shelf Hill, he arrested the defendant in Bibb county; that after the arrest, while he and Hill were carrying the defendant to the house of the man for whom he was working, three men came up, and asked him and Hill what they were going to do with the defendant; that he replied that the defendant could speak for himself. The solicitor then asked the witness to state what the defendant said. The defendant objected to this question upon the ground that it had not been shown that the confession, if there was any, was voluntary. Thereupon, in answer to interrogatories propounded to the witness, he restated the facts as set out above, and further testified that there were no threats made to the defendant, and no inducements offered him, to get him to make the confession; that no one told defendant that it would be better for him to confess, or anything like that that no one drew their weapons on the defendant, or made any demonstrations towards him. Thereupon the court overruled the objection, and allowed the question to be asked. To this ruling the defendant duly excepted. The witness then stated that the defendant said: "I shot him [deceased] with rocks, and he crawled into the brush; and I shot him again, in the burr of the ear, and deceased said: 'Don't shoot me again any more. Go and tell my ma.' And he was not dead, and I stabbed him and cut him with my knife across the bowels. Then I put him in the brush heap and burned him all night; and part of him would not burn up, and I buried it in the morning in a mudhole." There was other evidence tending to connect the defendant with the crime. The defendant, as a witness in his own behalf,...