Nolan and Guthrie v. State

• Decision Date: 18 January 1943
• Docket Number: 4278
• Citation: 167 S.W.2d 503,205 Ark. 103
• Parties: NOLAN AND GUTHRIE v. STATE
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

167 S.W.2d 503

205 Ark. 103

NOLAN AND GUTHRIE v. STATE

4278

Supreme Court of Arkansas

January 18, 1943

Appeal from Searcy Circuit Court; Garner Fraser, Judge; affirmed.

Judgment affirmed.

W. F Reeves, for appellant.

Jack Holt, Attorney General, and Jno. P. Streepey, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.

OPINION

MCFADDIN, J.

Appellants were convicted of the crime of arson and have appealed. The barn of Mrs. Mary Massey was destroyed by fire about two-thirty, Sunday morning, April 19, 1942. The next day tracks were found leading from the highway to the barn lot and then back to the highway. Jason Nolan's shoes were fitted into these tracks, and he admitted that the shoes were his and that he wore them the night of the fire. At the trial of the case, Nolan's alleged confession was introduced. While the appellants were in jail, a Dictaphone was secretly installed; and witnesses who listened testified to the secret conversation between the two appellants involving, among other matters, a statement that Nolan would confess and that Guthrie would try to get him off easy. Other facts appear hereinafter.

We discuss separately the appeal of each appellant.

I. Nolan's Appeal

Appellant Nolan contended that his confession was not freely and voluntarily given, and that the trial court erred in admitting it in evidence. When the confession was offered by the State, the question of its admissibility was heard by the court in the absence of the jury, and forty pages of the transcript are devoted to this evidence. Then the trial court admitted the confession in evidence, but cautioned the jury in part: "In this case at bar, here is the usual and ordinary conflict in the testimony where defendant repudiates or undertakes to repudiate an alleged confession. . . . The court is not presuming to pass on the testimony or credibility of the witnesses. That is what we have a jury for. Therefore, the court is ruling that it is a matter for the jury; and whether or not this confession is freely and voluntarily made will be submitted to the jury." Then there was an instruction to the same effect along with the other instructions. Thus the learned trial court followed the practice approved by this court in a number of cases, and there was no error in admitting the confession. Charles v. State, 198 Ark. 1154, 133 S.W.2d 26; Brown v. State, 198 Ark. 920, 132 S.W.2d 15; Hendrix v. State, 200 Ark. 973, 141 S.W.2d 852.

The confession, coupled with the proof of the tracks and the other evidence, was sufficient to support the conviction. Graham v. State, 202 Ark. 981, 154 S.W.2d 584. The admission of the testimony about the tracks in question was entirely proper because appellant's shoes were found in his home and fitted into the tracks, and appellant admitted that they were his shoes and that he was wearing them the night that the barn was burned. Hendrix v. State, supra. See, also, Penton v. State, 194 Ark. 503, 109 S.W.2d 131.

We, therefore, conclude that there was ample evidence to sustain Nolan's conviction, and, as no error appears, the case against him is affirmed.

II. Guthrie's Appeal

The appellant, Carolus Guthrie, urges (1) that his motion for severance should have been granted, and (2) that the admission of the Nolan confession was fatally prejudicial to him, and (3) that there was not sufficient evidence to sustain his conviction.

1. The severance question. -- Appellant Guthrie moved the court to allow him a separate trial, and this was overruled, and the action of the court is assigned as error. Prior to the adoption of initiated Act No. 3 of 1936 (Acts of 1937 p. 1384), a defendant jointly indicted with another was entitled to a severance as a matter of right; but since the adoption of the said initiated Act, the granting of a severance is within the sound discretion of the trial court. Section 3976 of Pope's Digest. No evidence appears in this record which would indicate that the trial court abused its discretion in refusing Guthrie's motion for severance.

This same question was before this court in the case of Bennett and Holiman v. State, 201 Ark. 237, 144 S.W.2d 476, 131 A. L. R. 908; and immediately following the report of the case in A. L. R. there is an annotation on the question. Every argument advanced for a severance in the case at bar was advanced and considered by this court in the Bennett case.

2. The matter of the confession.--Appellant Guthrie contends that when the alleged confession against Nolan was introduced, the jury, by reason of human nature, would consider it as evidence against Guthrie, and that no cautionary instruction of the court could cure this situation. A similar contention was unsuccessfully made in the case of Lindsey v State, 201 Ark. 87, 143 S.W.2d 573, and disposed of in the following language: "It is argued that the jury could not consider the confessions for any purpose without considering them against appellant. But this does not necessarily follow. The jury was told to do so, and we perceive no reason why they may not have done it. The jury might well have asked, in their deliberations, and have answered the question, whether, aside from the confessions, there was evidence of appellant's participation in the crime. This they were required under the instructions to do before finding appellant guilty, and we conclude there was no error...